:W  THE : 

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J.  Paterson-Siry  tH 


BV 

4905 
.55 


tihvary  of  tire  trheolojical  ^tminavy 

PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 


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PRESENTED  BY 

The  Estate  of  the 
Rev.   John  B.  V/iedinger 

BV  4905  .S5 

Smyth,  J.  Paterson  1852- 

1932. 
On  the  rim  of  the  world 


ON  THE  RIM  OF 
THE  WORLD 


By 

J.  Paterson-Smyth,  B.D.,  Litt.  D.,  D.C.L. 

A  People's  Life  of  Christ 

Cloth $Z-S^ 

"  In  spite  of  the  splendor  of  learning  and  of  eloquence 
in  the  great  lives  of  Christ  by  Farrar,  Edersheim,  and 
Geikie,  we  should  not  be  at  all  surprised  if  <  The  Peo- 
ple's Life  of  Christ '  exceeded  them  all  in  sales  and  in 
influence." — Christian  Endeavor  World. 


74th  THOUSAND 

The  Gospel  of  the  Hereafter 

Cloth ;?i.5o 

Do  we  live  when  men  call  us  dead? 

Where  do  we  go  ? 

What  kind  of  ati  existence  shall  we  have  ? 

These  are  the  questions  which  it  answers  and  of  which 
the  Bishop  of  London  says :  "  It  has  already  comforted 
many  souls  and  taken  away  the  fear  of  death.  Makes 
life  beyond  the  grave  something  to  look  forward  to — 
something  to  enjoy." 

On  the  Rim  of  the  World 

75c. 

A  message  of  consolation — of  outlook  bright  and  hope- 
ful, for  that  crowd  which  stands  "  on  the  Rim  of  the 
World  "  gazing  out  through  the  earth-mists  toward  the 
land  where  their  beloved  have  gone.  No  unreal  vision- 
ing.  No  mawkish  sentiment.  A  clear  logical  book 
dealing  with  facts  and  proofs  on  which  faith  may  rest 
"  until  the  day  break  and  the  shadows  flee  away. " 


ON  THE  RIM 
THE  WORLD 

LOOKING    OUT    OVER    THE    WALL 


BY       y 
J.   PATERSON-'SMYTH 

B.D..  LiTT.D.,  D.C.L. 

AUTHOR   OF    "the    GOSPEL    OF   THE  HEREAFTER,"    "a   PEOPLe's 
LIFE    OF   CHRIST,"     ETC.,    ETC. 


New  York  Chicago 

Fleming     H.     Revell    Company 

London        and        Edinburgh 


Copyright,  1922,  by 
FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


PREFACE 

THE  purpose  of  this  little  book  is  to 
offer  assurance  and  consolation  to  that 
wistful  crowd  who  stand,  as  it  were, 
on  the  Rim  of  the  World  looking  out  through 
the  earth  mists  toward  that  land  where  their 
beloved  have  gone.  For  that  assurance  and 
consolation  I  would  lead  them  to  their  Bible 
to  study  the  teaching  of  those  who  know,  to 
hearken  when  the  Christ  and  the  men  who 
followed  with  Him  were  looking  out  over  the 
wall. 

But  I  desire  to  offer  them  some  little  guid- 
ance too.  For  amongst  them  are  some  who 
are  puzzled  or  attracted  by  modern  Spiritual- 
ism and  need  help  in  thinking. 

Perhaps  one  may  help  who  has  tried  to 
study  Spiritualism  sympathetically  with  open 
mind,  and  who  would  point  them  away  from 
it  to  the  saner  teaching  in  which  the  Lord  and 
His  apostles  look  beyond  the  earth-mists  and 
5 


6  PREFACE 

give  us  glimpses  at  least  of  the  truer  vision 
into  the  mysteries  of  that  Land  Unseen. 

I  have  incorporated  here  some  of  the  promi- 
nent thoughts  in  my  larger  book,  "The  Gospel 
of  the  Hereafter." 

J.  P.  S. 


CONTENTS 

I.     "What  We  Shall  Be—"         .  9 

II.     Listening  Across  the  Void    .  15 

III.  Learning    from    Those    Who 

Know 27 

IV.  Death  and  Afterwards    .        .  32 
V.     The  Life  Beyond       ...  47 

VI.     The  Communion  of  Saints     .  57 
VII.     "For    the    Love    of     God    Is 

Broader — "      ....  72 


I  'What  We  Shall  Be—" 

I   AM  thinking  of  the  great  multitude  that 
no  man  can  number  of  all  nations  and 
kindreds   and  peoples  and  tongues  who 
have  passed  away  out  of  this  life  of  earth  into 
the  great  adventure  of  the  Hereafter. 

I  am  thinking  of  the  loving  hearts  reaching 
out  after  them  standing  pathetically  on  the 
rim  of  the  world  looking  out  over  the  wall. 
The  earth-mists  hide  from  them  that  spirit 
land.  They  cannot  map  out  its  continents 
and  shores.  No  gleam  of  the  golden  cities 
has  ever  touched  their  eyes,  but  they  believe 
or  at  least  hope  that  out  beyond  the  mists  is 
a  land  where  their  beloved  dwell. 

And  I  think,  too,  of  another  crowd,  equally 
loving  and  not  all  unbelievers,  but  who  never 
come  to  peer  over  the  wall.  We  are  a 
strangely  dull  people,  we  humans.  An  un- 
thinking crowd  at  the  gate  of  unutterable 
mysteries.  There  are  wondrous  things  ahead, 
but  the  people  do  not  know  it.  There  is  no 
death,  but  the  people  do  not  believe  it.  Hu- 
man life  is  the  most  exciting,  romantic  adven- 
ture in  the  universe,  going  on  stage  after 
9 


10      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

stage  till  we  are  older  than  Methuselah  and 
then  on  again  through  the  infinite  eternities, 
and  yet  men  pass  into  the  Unseen  as  stupidly 
as  the  caterpillar  on  the  cabbage-leaf,  without 
curiosity  or  joy  or  wonder  or  excitement  about 
the  boundless  career  ahead. 

And  so,  instead  of  the  thrill  of  coming 
adventure  there  is  the  grey  monotony  of  aged 
lives  drawing  near  the  close,  and  the  pain  of 
bereavement  becomes  blank  desolation,  and 
that  upward,  forward  look  is  lost  which  helps 
to  draw  the  world  nearer  to  God. 

It  was  so  different  in  early  days,  when  the 
world  was  younger,  when  Christ's  revelation 
was  fresh.  Look  at  St,  John,  fourscore  years 
and  ten,  like  an  eager  boy  looking  out  into 
the  Great  Adventure:  "Beloved,  now  are  we 
the  sons  of  God,  and  it  doth  not  yet  ap- 
pear WHAT  WE  SHALL  BE." 

What  we  shall  be !  What  we  shall  be !  Is 
not  that  the  chief  delight  of  being  young? 
Guessing  and  hoping  and  wondering  what  we 
shall  be! 

The  dreariest  thing  in  life  is  dulness — 
monotony.  The  brightest  thing  in  life  is  out- 
look— vision.  And  God  has  given  us  that. 
Like  St.  John,  we  too  can  stand  on  the  rim 
of  the  world  and  look  out  over  the  wall. 


'WHAT  WE  SHALL  BE—"  ii 

Life  is  full  of  latent  possibilities — of  out- 
look, of  romance,  of  exciting  futures.  God 
has  made  it  so,  if  we  could  only  see  it.  God's 
world  of  nature  has  its  continuous  progress, 
its  ever  new  and  fascinating  stages.  God's 
caterpillars  in  their  next  stage  are  going  to 
be  soaring  butterflies — God's  acorns  are  to 
become  mighty  oaks — God's  dry  little  seeds  in 
the  granary  to-day  will  in  autumn  be  alive  in 
the  waving  harvests.  God's  world  of  nature 
is  full  of  romantic  possibilities,  and  God's 
world  of  men  is  infinitely  more  so,  and  one 
of  life's  delights  is  to  know  it  and  look  for- 
ward to  it,  guessing  what  we  shall  be.  Out- 
look. Vision.  That  is  what  gives  zest  to  life. 
That  is  what  we  need  to  make  life  bright  and 
beautiful. 

I  see  a  group  of  small  boys  sitting  at  their 
play,  and  their  eyes  are  bright,  looking  into 
the  future.  They  are  going  to  be  soldiers, 
and  sailors,  and  circus-riders,  and  travellers, 
and  all  sorts  of  things.  Because  they  are  boys 
with  the  enthusiasms  of  boyhood,  they  may 
be  anything.  All  the  possibilities  of  boyhood 
belong  to  them.  It  doth  not  yet  appear  what 
they  shall  be,  but  it  is  delightful  to  look  for- 
ward and  speculate  about  it. 

I  see  them  again  a  dozen  years  later.    They 


12      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

are  starting  in  life,  just  left  college,  young 
doctors  and  lawyers  and  clergy  and  business 
men — still  with  their  visions  and  dreams  of 
the  future.  It  doth  not  yet  appear  what  they 
shall  be,  but  because  they  are  yoimg  men,  all 
that  belongs  to  young  manhood  lies  before 
them,  as  they  look  forward  in  their  day- 
dreams. What  countries  they  shall  live  in, 
and  what  girl  they  shall  marry,  and  what  po- 
sitions and  what  work,  and  what  excitements, 
and  what  pleasure  lie  before  them.  Ah,  it  is 
delightful  to  be  young,  realising  the  possibili- 
ties in  front — dreaming  of  what  we  shall  be. 
I  see  a  crowd  of  older  people,  men  and 
women,  dull,  uninterested.  "We  are  no  longer 
young,"  they  say;  "we  are  middle-aged  or 
elderly.  And  we  have  ceased  looking  for- 
ward. We  have  lost  the  vision.  We  have  not 
become  as  great  as  we  expected,  or  as  good 
as  we  expected.  We  are  fairly  comfortable. 
We  have  not  much  to  complain  of.  But  life 
is  a  bit  dull.  The  path  is  a  bit  monotonous 
now.  We  have  traversed  most  of  it.  We  can 
see  to  the  end,  there  are  no  more  romantic 
possibilities  to  make  life  exciting,  no  more 
visions  of  'what  we  shall  be.' " 

Don't  believe  it!     Not  a  word  of  it.    The 
visions  are  there  all  right.     Look  out  over 


'WHAT  WE  SHALL  BE—"  13 

the  wall.  This  life  of  yours  is  only  one  of 
the  stages  in  your  career,  and  not  the  first 
stage  either.  The  first  came  to  you,  silent, 
unconscious,  "where  the  bones  do  grow  in  the 
womb  of  her  that  is  with  child."  There  you 
grew  and  developed  for  the  next  move  for- 
ward. One  day  came  the  crisis  of  birth,  and 
you  passed  into  the  second  stage,  the  training 
stage  for  life  and  for  God.  Then  through  a 
new  crisis  you  pass  on  again  to  new  adven- 
tures. For  God  has  revealed  that  what  you 
call  death,  the  end  of  this  career,  is  but  birth 
into  a  new  and  more  wondrous  career  which 
again  passes  you  forward  into  still  nobler 
adventures,  and  that  again,  perhaps — who 
knows?    Who  shall  fix  the  limit? 

Nay,  you  are  not  elderly.  You  are  not 
middle-aged.  These  are  but  comparative  terms. 
A  house-fly  is  elderly  in  twenty-four  hours. 
An  oak-tree  is  young  after  a  hundred  years. 
And  you,  children  of  eternity,  with  ages  be- 
fore you — you  are  not  even  one-year-old  babies 
in  the  light  of  your  great  future. 

So  you  see  why  the  old  apostle  of  Ephesus 
did  not  feel  aged  or  elderly,  why  he  looked 
out  like  an  eager  boy  into  the  adventure  be- 
fore him.  "Beloved,  now  are  we  the  sons  of 
God,  but  we  don't  know  yet  what  we  shall 
be."     Ay,  we  don't  know  yet.     No  more  than 


14      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

did  the  small  boys  laughing  in  their  play  and 
going  to  be  soldiers  and  sailors  and  wonderful 
people.  We  don't  know  yet.  But  it  is  all 
before  us.  And  it  is  all  going  to  be  good  be- 
cause it  is  in  the  Father's  presence. 

So  I  bid  my  readers  do  what  I  sometimes 
do  myself,  look  out  into  the  void  and  guess 
like  the  children  what  you  shall  be  when  you 
are  older  than  Methuselah. 

Shake  off  the  dulness  and  monotony  from 
your  life.  Don't  talk  as  if  old  or  middle-aged 
any  more.  Be  children  again  in  the  presence 
of  the  Father,  and  with  happy  child-hearts 
keep  guessing  what  you  shall  be. 


Listening 
II  Across  the  Void 

TWO  groups  stand  to-day  on  the  Rim 
of  the  World  looking  out  over  the 
wall. 

One  group,  a  small  one,  consists  of  the 
adherents  of  Spiritualism.  (I  do  not  like  its 
name.  It  should  rather  be  called  "Spiritism." 
The  word  "spiritual"  has  with  most  of  us  a 
higher  connotation.) 

Theirs  is  a  startling  fascinating  claim,  the 
possibility  of  communication  with  the  other 
world.  Naturally  it  has  caused  considerable 
interest,  especially  in  the  terrible  bereavements 
after  the  War.  In  some  small  degree  it  at- 
tracts church  people  but  mainly  the  classes  who 
have  been  casual  in  religious  observances,  who 
have  never  made  their  own  the  Christian 
teaching  about  life  beyond  the  grave.  Though 
a  small  group,  they  are  too  prominent  to  be 
ignored  in  any  picture  of  that  crowd  gazing 
out  over  the  wall. 

No  responsible  teacher  has  a  right  to  make 
pronouncements  approving  or  condemning  any 
movement  which  he  has  not  himself  honestly 
15 


i6      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

studied.  I  have  tried  for  some  years  to  study 
with  open  mind  the  phenomena  of  Spiritism. 
I  have  had  experiences  interesting,  startling, 
puzzHng,  perplexing,  as  regards  results  in 
knowledge  disappointing  on  the  whole.  But 
experiences  which  have  set  me  thinking  deeply. 
I  have  read  pretty  widely  its  voluminous  lit- 
erature. Rather  profitless  reading.  Writers 
on  the  one  hand  too  easily  credulous,  on  the 
other  hand  too  obstinately  incredulous  or  de- 
termined to  explain  everything  by  evil  agencies 
— relieved  by  the  few  on  both  sides  of  candid 
mind  who  could  estimate  evidence  wisely  and 
reasonably. 

So  far,  the  result  of  my  thinking  is  this: 
not  to  condemn  Spiritism  peering  through  the 
earth-mists  into  another  world,  but  to  place  it 
in  its  lower  subordinate  position,  to  warn 
people  of  its  dangers,  and  to  set  opposite  it 
that  higher  "Spiritualism"  beyond  the  mists, 
which  Christianity  reveals  and  which  ought 
to  be  known  and  is  not  known  as  it  should  be 
by  the  people  of  a  Christian  land. 

Let  us  be  quite  frank  about  this  cult  of 
Spiritism.  The  Church  unhappily  has  aban- 
doned to  it  an  enquiry  which  she  should  have 
made  her  own.  And  Spiritism  has  badly 
failed.     It  has  grave  faults  and  dangers.     It 


LISTENING  ACROSS  THE  VOID      17 

is  exploited  by  charlatans  and  vulgarised  by 
frivolous  crowds.  It  has  belittled  that  other 
life,  making  it  seem  petty  and  trivial,  making 
it  little  more  than  an  extension  of  this  poor 
earth-life.  Its  current  teaching  has  soiled  the 
beauty  and  mystery  and  dignity  of  death  as 
represented  by  our  Lord.  Nay,  it  almost 
seems  to  ignore  that  Lord  Himself.  It  has 
built  on  very  insufficient  foundations  a  false 
and  dangerous  system  of  beliefs.  Not  to 
speak  of  the  fact  that  the  indiscriminate  and 
undisciplined  indulgence  of  its  activities  may 
gravely  injure  character  and  health. 

In  the  hands  of  people  largely  careless  and 
irreverent  Spiritism  is  having  mischievous  re- 
sults and  the  leaders  of  the  Church  are  wise 
and  right  in  their  warnings  to  Christian 
people. 

This  is  a  stem  indictment  of  Spiritism. 
Stem,  too,  should  be  the  blame  to  the  Chris- 
tian Church  which  has  abandoned  to  such 
hands  a  question  that  concerned  her  closely 
and  then  because  of  the  discredit  thus  brought 
upon  it  has  weakly  run  away  from  the  ques- 
tion altogether.  The  question  belonged  to 
Christianity.  It  is  a  question  of  importance 
and  of  fascinating  interest : 

Has  the  life  beyond  given  any  clear  evi- 


1 8      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

dence  of  its  existence?    Do  voices  ever  come 
across  the  void? 

Note  carefully  that  this  is  a  simple  ques- 
tion of  fact.  No  prejudice  against  any  "ism" 
should  affect  its  discussion.  It  has  nothing 
to  do  with  false  theories  that  may  result  from 
it.  It  belongs  not  to  Spiritists  but  to  all  hu- 
manity. It  is  not  a  question  of  theology, 
though  its  answers  may  affect  theology.  It 
is  a  plain,  scientific  problem  like  that  of  the 
X  rays  or  wireless  telegraphy.  It  may  be  a 
very  difificult  question  to  answer.  But  some 
attempt  should  have  been  made  to  answer  it. 
And  it  must  be  answered  scientifically  by  ob- 
servation and  experiment.  It  cannot  be  an- 
swered any  other  way. 

Note  also  that  it  is  not  a  question  to  be 
lightly  laughed  out  of  court.  Thoughtful  men 
are  seriously  discussing  it.  Students  of  psy- 
chical science  have  been  studying  it  for  years. 
Some  prominent  thinkers  would  answer  it  in 
the  affirmative.  Few  would  venture  posi- 
tively to  assert  the  negative.  Even  the  recent 
great  Council  of  Anglican  Bishops  at  Lam- 
beth says  in  its  cautious  calm  judicial  pro- 
nouncement on  the  question,  "there  are  phe- 
nomena which  seem  to  support  that  hypothesis. 
.  .  .  We  cannot  dismiss  the  possibility  of  it." 


LISTENING  ACROSS  THE  VOID       19 

Surely  even  that  bare  possibility  is  some- 
what exciting.  For  if  ever  it  should  rise  be- 
yond mere  possibility,  think  what  it  would 
mean  in  deepened  conviction  of  the  reality  of 
survival  after  death.  We  stand  before  the 
stage  of  the  Invisible  World  with  the  curtain 
tight  drawn,  seeking  in  the  Bible  some  knowl- 
edge of  our  departed  in  that  mysterious  life 
beyond.  Think  what  it  would  mean  if  sud- 
denly some  accident  should  lift  for  a  few 
inches  a  corner  of  the  curtain  just  enough  to 
shew  the  feet  of  living  people  moving  within 
— just  that  and  no  more — and  that  just  for 
a  moment.  Realise  the  force  of  the  startling 
conviction:  "There  are  living  people  within!" 
Think  of  the  new  delightful  reality  in  our 
study.  That  Bible  would  never  be  just  the 
same  again. 

Will  the  Church  ever  prayerfully  face  the 
question,  calling  to  her  aid  the  best  men  within 
her  border?  The  subject  deserves  more  seri- 
ous scientific  consideration  than  it  has  received. 
For  science,  as  Lord  Kelvin  said,  is  bound  to 
face  fearlessly  every  problem  that  can  fairly 
be  presented  to  it.  Psychical  science  has 
spread  itself  over  too  large  a  field.  We  need 
long  patient  study  concentrated  on  this  field 
alone,  to  judge  if  it  can  be  explained  away 


20      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

as  fraud  or  delusion  and  to  judge  if  it  be  real 
what  possibilities  are  in  it.  We  need  little 
bands  of  men  scientifically  trained  in  weigh- 
ing evidence,  not  prejudiced  nor  indifferent, 
not  credulous  nor  incredulous — men  of  honest, 
open  mind  and  especially  religious  men  in  the 
broadest  sense  of  the  word  who  would  face 
the  enquiry  honestly  and  solemnly  in  the  name 
of  the  God  of  truth. 

Shall  we  thus  some  day  come  to  the  lifting 
of  the  corner  of  the  curtain?  The  evidence 
points  that  way.  There  is  a  growing  impres- 
sion in  spite  of  often-proved  fraud  and 
trickery  that  all  is  by  no  means  fraud  and 
trickery,  that  suggested  hypotheses  such  as 
telepathy  or  hypnotism  cannot  explain  all  the 
phenomena — ^that  there  is  some  reality  behind 
— that  mysterious  voices  of  some  kind  do 
come  across  the  void.  Often  perplexing,  puz- 
zling, disappointing  voices.  "It  is  as  when  one 
sits  in  his  little  amateur  wireless  station  lis- 
tening for  wandering  flashes  from  the  ships 
at  sea.  Now  and  then  he  hears  cross  currents 
crackling  through  the  air  from  amateurs  like 
himself.  There  are  many  of  them  'listening 
in,'  and  some  of  them  he  suspects  sending 
spurious  messages."  Sometimes  he  gets  a 
message  clear  and  distinct,  but  whether  from 


LISTENING  ACROSS  THE  VOID      21 

the  sea  or  land  he  cannot  certainly  know.    But 
he  feels  there  is  something  there. 

If  ever  there  should  be  proved  unquestion- 
ably any  lifting  of  the  curtain,  even  the  rarest 
certain  happening  of  voices  from  the  other 
side,  Christian  people  should  accept  it  rever- 
ently and  thankfully  as  a  confirmation  of  their 
beliefs.  And  accept  it  only  for  what  it  is 
worth — no  more.  They  must  dissociate  it 
from  "isms,"  Spiritism  or  other,  which  would 
build  unwarranted  theories  upon  it. 

Be  it  noted  that  this  is  the  attitude  of  the 
Council  of  Bishops  which  I  have  referred  to. 
Their  pronouncement  is  mainly  directed  against 
the  false  teachings  of  Spiritism.  In  admitting 
the  possibility  of  the  lifting  of  the  curtain 
they  dissociate  it  altogether  from  such  false 
teachings  founded  on  the  belief  in  it.  Here 
is  the  final  sentence  in  their  report : 

"It  is  possible  that  we  may  be  on  the  threshold  of  a 
new  science  which  will  by  another  method  of  approach 
confirm  in  us  the  assurance  of  a  world  behind  and 
beyond  the  world  we  see  and  of  something  within  us 
by  which  we  are  in  contact  with  it.  We  could  never 
presume  to  set  a  limit  to  means  which  God  may  use  to 
bring  man  to  the  realization  of  spiritual  life.  But  there 
is  nothing  in  the  cult  (spiritism)  erected  on  this  science 
which  enhances,  there  is  much  indeed  which  obscures, 
the  meaning  of  that  other  world  and  our  relation  to  it 
as  unfolded  in  the  gospel  of  Christ." 


22      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

Probably  some  good  people  will  censure 
what  I  have  here  said.  But  I  must  write 
frankly,  if  at  all.  I  am  writing  for  that  wist- 
ful crowd  gazing  out  into  the  Unseen  not  only 
to  warn  them  against  the  risks  of  Spiritism 
but  also  to  share  with  them  a  hope  which  I 
cherish  myself  that  some  day  may  come  to 
them  through  the  Christian  Church  a  startling 
confirmation  of  their  cherished  behefs.  There 
are  more  things  in  heaven  and  earth  than  are 
dreamed  of  in  our  philosophy.  It  is  not  for 
us  to  turn  away  from  any  evidence  that  sets 
men  thinking.  It  is  not  for  us  to  limit  what 
God  may  do  for  us  in  concession  to  our  weak- 
ness if  it  should  be  His  holy  will. 

The  chief  evil  of  Spiritism  in  the  mind  of 
thoughtful  religious  people  is  that  it  seems  to 
live  on  a  low  plane.  It  tends  to  lower  our 
thoughts  of  the  great  solemn  World  of  the 
Dead.  It  is  a  common  remark  that  the  bulk 
of  what  profess  to  be  communications  from 
the  Unseen  are  petty  and  trivial.  No  doubt 
these  trivial  things  may  be  the  most  convinc- 
ing proofs  of  identification,  which  is  chiefly 
what  communicators  have  in  view.  No  doubt, 
too,  that  one  who  meets  friends  for  a  moment 
in  this  startling  way  is  not  likely  to  begin  by 
talking  of  his  most  sacred  feelings. 


LISTENING  ACROSS  THE  VOID      23 

But  perhaps  there  is  a  wider  explanation 
why  the  communications  of  Spiritism  tend  to 
lower  our  thoughts  of  that  life.  If  a  stranger 
from  another  planet  should  seek  to  know  the 
trend  of  religious  life  on  earth,  how  mislead- 
ing it  would  be  to  judge  from  the  chance  talk 
of  an  ordinary  crowd.  The  best  exponents  of 
Spiritism,  men  like  Sir  William  Barrett,  be- 
lieve that  it  can  get  in  touch  only  with  those 
on  the  earth  border,  who  have  not  long  died 
— at  any  rate,  only  with  those  who  are  still 
attracted  towards  the  world  they  have  left  by 
their  interest  in  still  living  friends.  They  are 
but  comparative  beginners  in  that  life,  the 
rearguard  as  to  time  of  the  advancing  host, 
the  outer  fringe  on  the  earthward  side. 

There  are  faithful  souls  in  that  rearguard 
of  the  host,  seldom  sought,  one  fears  in  pub- 
lic seances.  And  surely  they  are  the  minority. 
The  bulk  will  be,  as  in  this  world,  the  careless 
crowd  not  yet  at  least  risen  to  any  higher 
stage.  Theirs  are  the  voices  that  will  most 
be  heard  by  those  who  "listen  in"  at  that  half- 
open  door,  voices  still  careless,  trivial,  of  the 
earth  earthy.  All  the  more  when  the  listeners 
are  of  the  same  type  themselves.  For  like 
seems  to  attract  like. 

In  any  case  these  listeners  are  not  seeking 
religious  knowledge.    They  are,  naturally,  ab- 


24      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

sorbed  in  seeking  some  evidence  that  their 
friends  are  alive  and  happy. 

May  not  this  be  part  of  the  reason  why  the 
atmosphere  suggested  by  Spiritism  seems  in 
the  main  unworthy  of  that  hfe?  We  look  for 
deepening  spirituality  and  joyous  progress 
into  closer  fellowship  with  the  Divine — and 
the  general  impression  we  get  is  the  mere 
thought  of  having  a  good  time. 

That  is  the  chief  danger  of  Spiritism,  that 
it  is  likely  to  be  very  misleading.  If,  judging 
from  chance  voices  of  the  crowd  on  the  outer 
fringe,  it  should  suggest  a  whole  world  be- 
yond little  higher  than  this  poor  world  it  is 
likely  to  degrade  our  whole  thought  of  the  life 
hereafter. 

It  need  not  do  this.  If  it  would  be  wise 
and  humble  and  docile  and  reverent — if  it 
would  realise  its  position  as  a  mere  tyro  just 
groping  at  the  fringe  of  the  Unseen.  Even  on 
its  own  claims  up  to  this,  at  any  rate,  it  has  only 
come  to  the  earth  border,  lifting  a  little  cor- 
ner of  the  curtain,  enough  to  see  that  there 
are  live  people  beyond,  people  with  memory 
and  affection  and  interest  in  the  lives  left  be- 
hind them  on  earth.  If  its  results  be  recog- 
nised as  unquestionable  it  will  certainly  prove 
survival  after  death.    And  that  is  a  very  great 


LISTENING  ACROSS  THE  VOID      25 

gain.  We  are  so  constituted  that  no  teaching, 
even  of  the  Bible  itself,  can  be  so  impressive 
and  convincing  as  one  single  undoubted  ex- 
perience of  "the  touch  of  a  vanished  hand." 

But  mere  survival  after  death  is  a  very  poor 
thing  compared  with  the  splendid  Immortality 
and  joyous  upward  Progress  and  increasing 
Fellowship  with  God  which  the  Christian  reve- 
lation bids  us  look  forward  to. 

Spiritism  (granting  its  reality)  touches  but 
the  fringe  of  the  Unexplored  Country.  To 
the  Lord  of  that  Country  Himself  we  owe  any 
passing  glimpses  of  the  farther  land  and  the 
sunlit  heights  and  the  best  of 

"The  lovely  secrets  told  to  those  who  die." 

Therefore,  even  those  who  believe  most  in 
its  reality  should  recognise  the  grave  need  for 
at  least  modesty  and  diffidence  on  the  part  of 
Spiritism.  It  has  not  got  beyond  the  rudi- 
ments of  knowledge.  Maybe  it  will  some  day. 
More  probably  it  will  not.  For  it  has  serious 
limitations,  some  of  which  I  have  mentioned. 
Add  to  this  the  constant  danger  of  fraud  and 
the  fact  that  its  communications  are  confess- 
edly vitiated  by  the  personal  element  in  the 
medium.  With  all  these  limitations  it  surely 
becomes  Spiritism  to  be  at  least  humble  and 
modest  and  not  set  itself  up  as  a  new  religion 


26      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

or  a  new  revelation.  If  it  would  reverently 
keep  in  touch  with  Christian  teaching  about 
the  Unseen  each  might  perhaps  help  to  con- 
firm or  elucidate  the  other.  If  it  set  up  as  an 
exponent  of  life  in  the  Unseen  the  results  must 
be  disastrous. 


Learning  from 
III  Those  Who  Know 

NOW  turn  to  the  other  group,  men  with 
the  Christian  revelation  in  their  hands, 
with  their  eyes  on  that  other  world, 
searching  the  thoughts  of  those  who  could  see 
it  truly  and  not  trusting  themselves  to  chance, 
perplexing  voices,  drawing  near  to  listen  when 
the  Christ  and  the  men  who  learned  from  Him 
were  looking  out  over  the  wall.  There  is  a 
difference  in  their  outlook. 

The  Spiritist  group  is  like  a  tourist  startled 
and  fascinated  by  the  unexpected  vision  of  a 
land  unknown,  delightedly  catching  momen- 
tary glimpses  through  the  mists  of  its  outer 
LIFE,  its  cloud-like  scenery,  its  shadowy 
crowds  in  which  are  faces  that  he  seems  to 
know. 

This  other  group  is  equally  fascinated.  But 
it  looks  farther  and  deeper.  Its  thoughts  are 
rather  of  the  inner  life  of  that  land  beyond 
the  mists.  To  the  poor  humble  servant  of 
Christ  his  inner  life  is  the  supreme  thing,  his 
gratitude  and  trust,  his  personal  devotion,  his 
longing  to  grow  nobler  and  nearer  to  the 
27 


28      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

Divine.  This  is  his  central  Hfe.  He  feels  that 
if  there  be  growth  and  progress  for  his  be- 
loved in  the  Unseen  this  must  be  the  central 
line  of  its  development. 

And  his  Bible  confirms  that  view.  What 
few  glimpses  it  brings  of  the  Unseen  suggest 
always  a  life  not  only  vivid  and  conscious,  but 
a  life  where  nobleness  of  character  is  the  cen- 
tral thought,  a  life  of  restful,  grateful,  loving, 
happy  progress  towards  God. 

And  here  let  me  emphasise  the  duty  of  the 
Church,  especially  in  these  pathetic  days  of 
widespread  bereavement  after  the  War,  the 
duty  of  teaching  more  fully  what  has  been 
given  her  to  teach  of  that  life  of  the  spirit- 
world.  Though  the  Bible  is  reticent  about 
that  spirit-world  it  has  very  much  to  teach 
which  is  not  being  taught.  And  it  is  a  very 
fascinating  study.  All  touch  with  the  Unseen 
must  ever  be  fascinating  to  us  on  this  side, 
and  we  cannot  wonder  that  many  should  seek 
it  through  Spiritism  if  they  are  not  directed 
to  the  truer  vision  which  God  has  given  us. 

The  Bible  keeps  that  other  world  promi- 
nently before  us.  Through  all  the  teachings 
of  our  Lord  runs  the  thought  of  another 
world  encircling  this  world  of  time  as  the  sea 
encircles  the  land.     In  the  parable  of  Dives, 


LEARNING  29 

of  the  Rich  Fool,  the  Virgins,  the  Talents, 
everywhere  the  issues  lead  up  to  the  World 
Beyond,  He  keeps  lifting  the  curtain  for 
glimpses  of  a  farther  horizon,  giving  the  true 
perspective  to  human  life  by  seeing  us  always 
in  a  wide,  spacious  Universe  where  both 
worlds  are  one.  He  tells  of  the  nearness  of 
that  world  and  that  it  is  an  infinitely  kindly, 
friendly  world,  deeply  interested  in  this  world. 
He  tells  of  its  joy  over  one  sinner  that  repents 
on  earth,  of  the  earth-children's  guardian 
angels  "always  beholding  the  face  of  the  Fa- 
ther which  is  in  Heaven."  He  tells  of  Abra- 
ham in  that  Unseen  Life  rejoicing  to  see  His 
day  here,  so  interested  is  that  world  in  ours. 
In  the  story  of  the  Transfiguration  Moses  and 
Elijah,  two  of  the  great  old-world  saints,  come 
out  from  the  spirit-land  to  meet  their  Lord 
and  speak  "of  His  decease  which  He  should 
accomplish  in  Jerusalem,"  suggesting  surely 
the  deep  absorbing  interest  which  they  and 
their  great  comrades  within  the  Veil  were 
taking  in  the  earthly  mission  of  their  Lord. 

Whatever  we  may  think  of  the  phenomena 
of  modern  spiritualism  there  can  be  no  ques- 
tion of  the  Spiritualism  high  and  true  which 
surrounds  the  life  of  Jesus  in  the  Gospels. 
From  the  spirit  crowd  which  hailed  His  birth 
on  the  Bethlehem  plains  down   to  the   "two 


30      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

men  in  white  apparel"  who  appeared  at  His 
Ascension  we  have  repeated  incursions  from 
another  world,  voices,  appearances,  indications 
not  to  be  questioned  of  a  sphere  outside  our 
own  deeply  interested  in  our  world  here. 

We  are  taught  that  that  world  is  around 
us  still.  It  is  not  visible  to  us  who  look  out 
over  the  wall.  We  cannot  map  out  its  con- 
tinents and  shores.  No  gleam  of  its  golden 
cities  has  ever  touched  our  eyes.  Perhaps  it 
is  only  because  the  light  is  wrong,  because  the 
glare  of  this  world  obscures  it.  Just  as  hap- 
pens every  day  when  the  glare  of  the  sunlight, 
revealing  to  us  every  little  flower  and  leaf  and 
insect,  shuts  out  from  us  the  starry  universe 
which  stands  forth  in  the  midnight  sky.  The 
light  is  wrong  for  it.  If  we  never  got  dark- 
ness to  correct  our  vision  we  might  never  be- 
lieve in  that  starry  world  at  all.  Maybe  only 
the  closing  of  our  eyes  in  the  darkness  of 
death  will  put  us  in  the  right  light  for  seeing 
that  spirit  land.  But  we  know  that  it  is 
around  us  just  the  same  as  it  so  manifestly 
was  in  the  life  of  Jesus, 

Thus  the  men  of  earliest  Christian  days 
thought  about  the  spirit  world.  Think  of  that 
bold  picture  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  to 
encourage  us  in  our  Christian  race.  "We  are 
compassed  about  with  a  great  cloud  of  wit- 


LEARNING  31 

nesses,"  that  long  list  of  the  old  heroes  of  the 
Faith  which  the  writer  has  just  enumerated 
crowding,  as  it  were,  the  galleries  of  their 
world  to  watch  the  struggles  of  their  descend- 
ants on  earth,  like  the  "old  boys"  at  a  great 
school  anniversary  coming  back  to  watch  the 
boys  in  the  contests  which  they  themselves 
had  taken  part  in  forty  years  ago.  And  the 
picture  deepens  in  solemnity  later  on  as  he 
bids  them  look  up  "to  the  general  assembly 
and  church  of  the  firstborn  which  are  written 
in  heaven,  and  to  God  the  judge  of  all,  and 
to  the  spirits  of  just  men  made  perfect,  and 
to  Jesus  the  mediator  of  the  new  covenant."  ^ 
Thus  do  Christian  men  seek  the  deeper 
knowledge  of  life  at  the  other  side,  searching 
the  thoughts  of  those  who  could  see  it  truly, 
drawing  near  to  listen  when  the  Christ  and 
the  men  who  learned  from  Him  were  looking 
out  over  the  wall. 

*  Heb.  xii.,  i,  22,  23. 


Death 
IV  and  Afterwards 

WHAT  has  the   Christian   Church   to 
teach  for  the  helping  of  that  crowd 
on  the  rim  of  the  world  looking  out 
over  the  wall? 

Here  is  a  desolate  mother  mourning  her 
dead.  Kindly,  sympathetic  friends  offer  what 
comfort  they  can,  usually  vague  conventional 
phrases  that  do  not  grip.  Alas!  it  does  not 
help  much. 

"Console  if  you  will,  I  can  bear  it 
'Tis  a  kindly  wasting  of  breath. 
But  not  all  the  talking  since  Adam 
Can  make  death  to  be  other  than  death." 

What  is  the  full  message  of  the  Church  of 
Christ  in  the  matter?  Has  she  any  further 
word  from  her  Master  to  the  world  "to  make 
death  to  be  other  than  death"  ?  Ay,  has  she ! 
Listen  to  it.  That  there  is  no  death.  That 
what  seems  to  us  death  is  only  birth  into  a 
larger,  fuller  life  with  nobler  opportunities, 
with  more  developed  powers.  That  as  the 
baby's  eyes  open  from  the  darkness  of  the 
womb  to  sunlight  upon  this  earth,  so  do  the 
32 


DEATH  AND  AFTERWARDS  33 

eyes  that  close  in  the  darkness  of  death  open 
upon  "a  Hght  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land." 
How  can  I  put  before  you  in  the  short  limit 
of  these  pages  the  message  of  our  holy  religion 
about  those  who  die?  You  must  think  hard. 
You  must  follow  closely. 

First  note  the  Bible's  sharp  distinction  be- 
tween ME  and  the  body  which  I  temporarily 
inhabit.  It  is  but  my  "earthly  tabernacle  to 
be  dissolved"  one  day  to  be  replaced  by  a 
"house  not  made  with  hands  eternal  in  the 
heavens." 

Grip  that  thought  first.  Concentrate  your 
attention  on  the  self  within  you — the  mysteri- 
ous, spiritual  being  that  you  call  "I" — that 
real  self  which  stands  behind  the  body  look- 
ing out  now  through  the  windows  of  your 
eyes,  receiving  messages  through  the  portals 
of  your  ears ;  which  is  not  the  body,  but  owns 
and  uses  the  body;  which  is  not  the  brain,  but 
works  through  the  brain,  its  instrument ;  which 
is  not  the  train  of  thoughts  and  feelings  and 
emotions,  but  experiences  these  thoughts  and 
feelings  and  emotions. 

Realise  that  this  mysterious  spiritual  "I" 
within  is  the  real  man  himself — that  the  body 
is  only  his  outward  garment,  continually  being 
woven  by  him  out  of  certain  chemical  sub- 


34      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

stances.  That  this  body  is  continually  chang- 
ing its  substance  like  the  rainbow  in  the  sky 
or  the  eddy  in  the  river.  That  the  body  you 
have  to-day  is  no  more  the  body  of  five  years 
ago  than  the  fire  on  your  hearth  to-night  is 
the  same  that  was  there  this  morning.  I  have 
had  a  dozen  different  bodies  since  I  was  born. 
I  am  all  the  time  laying  them  aside  like  the 
old  clothes  that  I  have  done  with.  But  *T" 
am  the  same  still. 

Realise  that  my  brain  is  only  the  instru- 
ment played  on  by  "me,"  who  stand  behind 
it.  That  the  particles  of  my  brain  are  always 
changing.  That  I  have  had  a  dozen  brains 
since  I  was  born,  so  far  as  its  material  par- 
ticles are  concerned.  Yet  memory  insists  that 
I  am  still  the  same  "I"  in  spite  of  all  these 
changes  of  brain,  and  I  can  remember  what 
I  said  and  did  with  those  old  vanished  brains 
of  mine  twenty  and  thirty  years  ago. 

Realise  that  "I"  am  not  the  thoughts  and 
feelings  and  emotions.  They  are  mine.  They 
are  not  Me.  They  are  only  passing  phases  of 
my  being.  They  are  always  changing.  Every- 
thing around  is  changing.  I  remain  the  same 
being  always.  Nothing  else  in  the  universe 
remains  the  same — except  God.    God  and  "I." 

Realise  especially  the  continuity  of  personal 
identity  in  this  *T,"  this  self  within,  in  spite 


DEATH  AND  AFTERWARDS         35 

of  all  bodily  changes.  Not  a  particle  remains 
of  the  brain  or  nerves  or  tongue  or  eyes  or 
hands  or  feet  with  which  "I"  did  a  good  or 
evil  deed  twenty  years  ago,  but  it  is  absolutely 
impossible  for  me  to  doubt  that  it  was  "I" 
who  did  it,  that  "I"  to-day  deserve  the  praise 
or  blame  which  is  due  to  it. 

Now,  has  this  helped  you  even  a  little  to 
think  of  this  mysterious,  supernatural  per- 
sonal self  and  to  think  of  it  apart  from  the 
perishable  body,  apart  from  the  brain  and 
heart  and  eye  and  tongue:  the  instruments 
which  it  uses?  For,  if  so,  you  will  see  better 
what  the  Bible  means  by  a  man's  soul  as  dis- 
tinguished from  his  body.  You  will  see  better 
that  this  self  which  you  call  "I"  is  the  real 
man,  the  man  in  the  centre  of  his  being,  the 
man  as  he  lives  beneath  the  eye  of  God  and 
enters  into  relations  with  God — the  man  for 
whom  the  Bible  announces  that  exciting  ad- 
venture in  the  long  ages  of  the  Hereafter. 
And  as  you  think  how  he  has  survived  the 
putting  away  of  every  part  of  the  body  a 
dozen  times  over,  you  find  it  easier  to  under- 
stand the  revelation  of  Christ  that  he  will 
survive  the  final  putting  away  of  the  whole 
body  at  death. 

Now  call  up  before  you  the   face  of  your 


36      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

departed  one,  and  then  grip  with  both  hands 
the  fact  that  this  life  as  he  knew  it  is  but  one 
stage  in  God's  progressive  life-plan  for  him. 
And  not  the  first  stage  either.  Already  he  has 
had  his  pre-natal  life,  "where  the  bones  did 
grow  in  the  womb  of  her  that  was  with  child." 
That  was  his  first  life.  From  that  dull, 
lower  existence  he  passed  through  a  great 
crisis  into  the  higher  life  of  earth  with  its 
new  educative  experiences.  That,  too,  was 
but  a  preparatory  stage,  the  kindergarten 
stage,  the  caterpillar  stage,  of  his  career.  And 
what  we  call  death,  the  end  of  this  earth 
career,  is  revealed  to  us  in  Scripture  as  birth 
into  a  new  and  more  exciting  career  stretch- 
ing away  into  the  far  future,  age  after  age, 
aeon  after  aeon,  whose  prospect  should  stir  the 
very  blood  within  us.  God  only  knows  how 
many  stages  there  are  still  before  we  reach 
"unto  the  stature  of  the  full-grown  man,  even 
unto  the  stature  of  the  fulness  of  Christ." 

There  is  nothing  which  so  touches  some  of 
us  as  a  thing  with  "makings"  in  it,  a  thing 
with  untold  potentialities  in  it,  a  thing  which 
may  come  in  the  future  to  God  alone  knows 
what.  Talk  of  the  caterpillar  which  is  to 
develop  into  the  butterfly,  or  the  acorn  which 
shall  one  day  be  a  mighty  oak!  Why,  these 
miracles  are  but  child's  play  compared  with 


DEATH  AND  AFTERWARDS         37 

the  miracles  potentially  wrapped  up  in  this 
mysterious  self.  No  wildest  fairy-tale  can 
suggest  the  wonder  of  man's  possibilities  as 
he  passes  out  into  the  new  adventure  of  the 
life  beyond. 

Death  is  the  appointed  gateway  into  that 
life  beyond — the  only  way  in.  And  we  are 
horribly  afraid  of  it.  I  suppose  it  is  only 
natural  that  we  should  shrink  from  being 
launched  against  our  will  into  the  Unknown. 
I  suppose,  if  we  had  had  intelligence  enough 
to  think  about  it,  we  should  have  been  equally 
afraid  of  being  launched,  at  the  crisis  of  birth, 
into  this  unknown  world  where  we  are  now. 

And  yet,  ought  we  to  be  so  afraid  of  death? 
Has  not  Christ  revealed  to  us  that  this  ter- 
rible thing  that  we  so  fear  for  him  who  is 
gone  really  only  means  that  at  the  close  of 
this  poor  limited  kindergarten  stage  of  his 
history  Death  has  come — God's  beneficient 
angel — to  lead  him  into  the  next  stage  of 
being?  Why  should  we  be  afraid?  Birth 
gave  him  much,  death  will  give  much  more. 
For  death  means  birth  into  a  fuller 
LIFE.  What  a  fright  he  gives  us,  this  good 
angel  of  God!  We  do  not  trust  his  Master 
much. 

Do  you  say  that  you  do  not  know  what  is 


38      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

before  your  friend — that  it  is  a  "leap  off  into 
the  dark"  ?  Have  we  not  learned  from  Scrip- 
ture that  it  is  much  less  of  "dark"  than  some 
of  us  thought?  And  may  it  not  be  much  less 
of  a  "leap  off"  than  we  think — only  a  closing 
of  the  eyes  here  and  an  opening  of  them 
there?  May  not  the  birth  into  that  life  be  as 
simple  as  the  birth  into  this?  May  not  our 
fright  be  like  that  of  Don  Quixote  when 
blindfolded  he  hung  by  his  wrist  from  the 
stable  window  and  they  told  him  that  a  tre- 
mendous abyss  yawned  beneath  him?  He  is 
in  terror  of  the  awful  fall.  Maritornes  cuts 
the  thong  with  gladsome  laughter,  and  the 
gallant  gentleman  falls — just  four  inches! 
May  we  not  believe  that  God  reserves  just  as 
blithesome  a  surprise  for  us  when  our  time 
comes  to  discover  the  simplicity,  the  agreeable- 
ness,  the  absence  of  any  serious  change  in 
what  we  call  dying  ?  ^ 

We  have  all  noticed  that  expression  of  com- 
posed calm  which  comes  on  the  faces  of  the 
newly  dead.  Some  say  it  is  due  to  muscular 
relaxation.  Perhaps  so.  But  perhaps  not. 
One  likes  to  think  it  may  be  something  more 
Who  knows  that  it  may  not  be  a  last  message 
of  content  and  acquiescence   from  those   de- 

'  I  have  here  freely  adapted  some  phrases  from  Edwin 
Arnold,   "Death   and   Afterwards." 


DEATH  AND  AFTERWARDS         39 

parting  souls  who  at  the  moment  of  departure 
know  perhaps  a  little  more  than  ourselves — a 
message  of  good  cheer  and  pleasant  promise 
by  no  means  to  be  disregarded? 

Let  us  now  try  to  catch  some  of  those  pass- 
ing glimpses  which  the  Bible  gives  us  through 
the  mysterious  gateway  of  death,  where  our 
departed  one  has  gone  on  his  mysterious 
journey  into  the  strange  new  land.  From  the 
nature  of  the  case  we  must  not  expect  much. 
In  the  first  place,  in  our  present  imperfect, 
\  limited  condition,  with  senses  fitted  only  for 
this  poor  earthly  life,  it  would  probably  be 
impossible  to  teach  us  much  about  the  higher 
life  of  the  spirit  world.  How  can  you  teach 
a  blind,  deaf  man  about  this  world  of  beau- 
tiful sights  and  sounds  in  which  you  are  liv- 
ing? How  could  God  teach  us  definite  details 
about  a  life  which  no  experience  of  ours  can 
help  us  to  imagine?  And,  besides  that.  Scrip- 
ture is  intended  to  guide  our  conduct  in  this 
world,  not  to  gratify  our  speculations  about 
another  world.  Yet  there  is  more  revealed 
than  people  think. 

First,  watch  our  Lord  draw  the  curtain  a 
little  in  His  story  of  the  Rich  Man  and 
Lazarus.    The  "story,"  I  say,  not  the  "para- 


40      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

ble."  It  is  no  parable.  A  parable  is  the  state- 
ment of  an  analogy  between  visible  things  and 
invisible.  This  is  a  direct  statement  about  the 
invisible  things  themselves.  Jesus  is  telling 
what  happens  after  death. 

Their  friends  had  followed  these  men  to  the 
grave,  and  could  go  no  farther.  Jesus  fol- 
lows them  in  thought  into  the  life  beyond  the 
gateway.  His  story  is  not  at  all  intended  as 
a  revelation  of  that  life.  It  is  simply  a  pass- 
ing reference  to  it  in  warning  against  selfish- 
ness. But  it  lifts  the  curtain  a  little  bit. 
Clearly  He  is  speaking  not  of  the  far  here- 
after, but  of  the  unseen  life  of  to-day,  run- 
ning on  side  by  side  with  this  earthly  life.  For 
you  see  the  men  referred  to  are  not  long 
dead.  Dives'  brothers  are  still  living  here. 
Dives  is  quite  conscious  that  the  ordinary  life 
of  men  on  earth  is  still  going  on.  Jesus  is 
telling  of  the  life  in  which  our  departed  ones 
are  living  to-day.  And,  though  His  purpose 
be  not  any  definite  teaching  about  it,  yet  surely 
He  would  not  misrepresent  it. 

First,  then,  I  notice  that  that  life  In  its  in- 
most experiences  seems  very  like  this  life,  and 
follows  from  it  quite  naturally.  He  depicts 
it  as  a  clear,  conscious  life.  They  are  not 
dead  nor  asleep  nor  unconscious.  They  are 
very   much   alive.      He   represents   them   as 


DEATH  AND  AFTERWARDS         41 

thinking  and  speaking  and  feeling.  Lazarus 
is  feeling  "comforted."  Dives  is  feeling  "tor- 
mented," and  is  thinking  keenly  of  his  own 
misery  and  of  his  brothers'  danger  on  earth 
at  that  moment.  So  actively  alive  are  they  all 
to  him  that  he  wants  one  of  them  to  go  back 
to  earth  to  tell  his  brothers  about  it. 

Next  I  learn  that  each  feels  himself  the 
same  continuous  "I"  that  he  was  on  earth, 
Lazarus  feels  himself  the  same  Lazarus,  Dives 
feels  himself  the  same  Dives,  the  brother  of 
those  five  boys. 

Then  I  read  on  Christ's  authority  that  there 
is  no  break  in  memory.  Of  course  there  could 
not  be  if  I  am  still  "L"  But  our  Lord  con- 
firms this.  Lazarus  remembers  Dives.  Dives 
remembers  Lazarus  so  well  that  he  wants  him 
to  go  back  to  convert  his  brothers.  Ay,  he 
remembers  the  brothers  in  the  old  Jerusalem 
home,  the  five  boys  that  grew  up  beside  him. 
He  remembers  sorrowfully  that  they  have 
grown  to  be  selfish  men  like  himself,  perhaps 
through  his  fault.  He  is  thinking  about  them 
and  troubling  about  them.  And  Abraham  as- 
sumes this  memory  as  a  matter  of  course. 
"My  son,  remember  that  thou  in  thy  life- 
time .  .  ." 

I  read  on,  "Now  he  is  comforted  and  thou 
art  tormented."     That  again  is  just  what  I 


42      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

should  expect.  As  the  curtain  rises  we  get  a 
glimpse  of  him,  away  in  the  dim  distance 
amid  the  solitudes  of  great  spaces,  a  little 
shrivelled  soul  in  the  infinite  loneliness.  And 
in  torment.  For  conscience  is  awake  now  that 
has  slept  through  the  years  when  he  "lived 
sumptuously  every  day."  The  jar  of  death 
has  awakened  it.  It  is  all  quite  natural.  If 
"I"  am  still  the  same  "I"  in  full,  vivid,  con- 
scious life,  in  full  memory  of  the  past — if  I 
have  passed  out  of  the  mists  of  earth  into  the 
full  light  of  the  Eternal,  where  everything 
is  seen  at  its  full  value,  where  money  counts 
for  nothing  and  love  counts  for  everything, 
it  is  of  course  natural  that  the  good  man 
should  feel  comforted  and  the  bad  man  should 
feel  tormented. 

In  the  expression  "carried  by  the  angels 
into  Abraham's  bosom,"  I  think  we  have  our 
Lord's  indication  that  the  poor  soul  does  not 
go  out  solitary  into  a  great  lone  land.  Per- 
haps we  have  a  suggestion  also  that  Dives  was 
the  better  for  the  discipline  of  that  new  life. 
Instead  of  the  selfishness  of  his  life  on  earth, 
we  have  now,  amid  all  his  own  trouble,  anxiety 
for  the  welfare  of  his  five  brothers  on  earth. 
But  I  am  not  concerned  here  with  that.  I  am 
looking  only  for  indications  of  a  conscious  life 
beyond  death's  gateway. 


DEATH  AND.  AFTERWARDS         43 

We»  get  another  glimpse  of  that  life  in  the 
story  of  the  Transfiguration,  when  Moses  and 
Elias  come  out  from  that  life  to  meet  the  Lord 
and  to  speak  with  Him  "of  His  decease,  which 
He  should  accomplish  at  Jerusalem"  (Luke 
ix.  31).  Does  it  not  suggest  at  once  the  deep 
interest  which  they  and  their  comrades,  the 
great  souls  within  the  veil,  were  taking  in  the 
mighty  scheme  of  Redemption  that  was  being 
worked  out  on  earth?  Does  it  not  suggest 
that  those  in  the  spirit  land  are  watching  our 
doings  here?  Does  it  not  help  us  to  anticipate 
the  joy  in  that  wondrous  life  when,  straight 
from  the  cross,  Christ  the  triumphant  victor 
"descended  into  Hades"  (Apostles'  Creed)  to 
proclaim  the  glad  news  to  the  dead  (I  Peter 
iv.  18) ;  to  unfurl  His  banner  and  set  up  His 
cross  in  the  great  world  of  the  departed? 

Our  next  hint  comes  when  the  Lord  is 
dying  on  the  cross.  The  penitent  thief  is 
hanging  beside  Him.  Death  is  drawing  near. 
The  poor  sinner  is  about  to  take  the  leap  off 
into  the  dark.  He  does  not  know  what  is  be- 
fore him :  darkness — unconsciousness — noth- 
ingness— ^what?  He  does  not  know.  The 
only  one  on  earth  who  does  know  is  on  a  cross 
beside  him.  "Lord,  remember  me  when 
Thou  comest  into  Thy  kingdom."     And 


44      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

Jesus  said:  "To-day  thou  shalt  be  with 
Me  in  Paradise."  Not  in  Heaven,  but  in 
Paradise — the  Jews'  word  for  the  resting- 
place  of  good  men  after  death.  Now,  when 
one  man  says  to  another  at  such  a  time,  "To- 
day you  shall  be  with  me,"  surely  it  suggests 
"To-night,  when  our  dead  bodies  are  hanging 
on  the  cross,  you  and  I  will  be  living  a  full, 
conscious  life,  and  you  will  remember  our 
acquaintance  here  upon  the  earth;  we  shall 
know  each  other  as  the  two  who  hung  together 
this  morning  on  Calvary." 

Only  three  hours  later  the  Lord  passed  in 
Himself  into  that  Unseen  Land  where  the 
poor  thief  had  gone  before  Him.  "Put  to 
death  in  the  flesh,  but  quickened  in  the  spirit," 
St.  Peter  tells  us,  He  went  in  to  proclaim  good 
tidings  to  them  that  were  dead  (I  Peter 
iii.  i8,  19;  iv.  18).  Surely  these  must  have 
been  alive  and  conscious.  This  journey  of 
Jesus  was  a  most  prominent  teaching  in  the 
early  Church  and  has  been  embodied  as  an 
article  of  the  Christian  faith:  "He  descended 
into  Hades." 

I  am  not  discussing  any  of  those  questions 
here.  I  am  but  offering  you  a  few  hints  from 
Scripture  that  your  departed  have  only  moved 
on  into  a  new  stage  of  conscious  life  and  ad- 
venture. 


DEATH  AND  AFTERWARDS         45 

In  the  next  chapter  I  mean  to  follow  out 
more  fully  the  teaching  of  Scripture  as  to  the 
life  beyond  death's  dark  gateway.  I  shall  try 
to  distinguish  between  those  who  have  died  in 
Christ's  faith  and  fear  and  those  of  whom  we 
dare  not  speak  with   any  such  confidence. 

Here  I  confine  myself  to  the  common 
thought  embodied  in  the  heathenish  symbol  in 
our  cemeteries,  a  broken  pillar  on  a  young 
man's  grave  to  indicate  a  life  broken  oH  in- 
complete.    It  is  false!     It  is  heathenish! 

Nay,  the  brave  young  life  that  you  loved 
on  earth  is  not  ended,  but  moved  on  to  de- 
velop in  other  and  nobler  ways.  I  am  not 
speaking  lightly  of  this.  My  own  eldest  boy 
is  gone  out  into  that  life,  and  it  never  occurs 
to  me  to  think  of  his  life  as  ended,  or  to  leave 
him  out  of  my  thoughts  or  prayers  any  more 
than  when  he  was  here.  Keep  your  boy  al- 
ways in  your  thoughts  and  prayers. 

"He  is  not  dead,  the  child  of  your  affection, 
But  gone  into  that  school 
Where  he  no  longer  needs  your  poor  protection, 
And  Christ  Himself  doth  rule." 

Think  of  your  boy  as  serving  at  one  side 
of  the  veil,  and  you  at  the  other — each  in  the 
presence  of  Christ.  Think  how  he  is  being 
lovingly  trained  and  disciplined;  how  all  his 


46      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

abilities  are  being  used  in  self-sacrificing 
deeds  for  others.  Not  in  a  glorified  selfish- 
ness, in  thanking  God  that  he  is  safe,  though 
his  brethren  be  lost.  Ah,  no!  But  in  perfect 
self-sacrifice,  even  as  his  Lord.  Think  of  him 
as  learning  to  fight  for  righteousness,  to  help 
the  weak,  ay,  mayhap,  to  go  out — God's 
brave  young  knight — into  the  darkness  after 
some  one  who  has  missed  Christ  on  earth. 
Realise  that,  and  your  whole  life  must  per- 
force grow  nobler.  And  realise  that  you  will 
not  have  to  wait  for  the  Resurrection  or  the 
Advent  to  meet  him  and  learn  all. 

When  your  death  comes  he  will  be  waiting 
for  you.  He  has  been  praying  and  watching 
over  you.  He  will  tell  you  of  all  that  has 
been  happening.  And  together  in  Christ's  lov- 
ing presence  you  will  work  and  wait  and  help 
your  brethren  and  look  forward  to  the  Heaven 
that  is  still  in  the  future. 

Thank  God  for  the  blessed  doctrine  of  the 
Paradise  Life  and  for  all  His  poor  penitent 
servants  departed  this  life  in  His  faith  and 
fear. 


V  The  Life  Beyond 

WE  have  been  trying  to  study  the 
meaning  of  death,  trying  with  dim 
eyes  to  peer  through  its  dark  gate- 
way. But  we  must  not  delay  at  death.  Death 
is  a  very  small  thing  in  comparison  with  what 
comes  after  it — that  wonderful,  wonderful, 
wonderful  world  into  which  death  ushers  us. 
Turn  away  from  the  face  of  your  dead.  Turn 
away  from  the  house  of  clay  which  held  him 
an  hour  ago.  The  house  is  empty,  the  tenant 
is  gone.  He  is  away  already,  gasping  in  the 
unutterable  wonder  of  the  new  experience. 

"O  change !  stupendous  change ! 
There  lies  the  soulless  clod. 
The  light  eternal  breaks, 
The  new  immortal  wakes. 
Wakes  with  his  God !" 

Oh,  the  wonder  of  it  to  him  at  first !  Years 
ago  I  met  with  a  story  in  a  sermon  by  Canon 
Liddon.  An  old  Indian  officer  was  telling  of 
his  battles — of  the  Indian  Mutiny,  of  the  most 
striking  events  in  his  professional  career; 
47 


48      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

and  as  he  vividly  described  the  skirmishes  and 
battles  and  sieges  and  hair-breadth  escapes,  his 
audience  hung  breathless  in  sympathy  and  ex- 
citement. At  last  he  paused;  and  to  their 
expressions  of  wonderment  he  quietly  replied, 
"I  expect  to  see  something  much  more  won- 
derful than  that."  As  he  was  over  seventy, 
and  retired  from  the  service,  his  listeners 
looked  up  into  his  face  with  surprise.  There 
was  a  pause;  and  then  he  said,  in  a  solemn 
undertone,  "I  mean  in  the  first  five  minutes 
after  death." 

That  story  caught  on  to  me  instantly.  That 
has  been  for  years  my  closest  feeling.  I  feel 
it  at  every  death-bed  as  the  soul  passes 
through.  I  believe  it  will  be  my  strongest 
feeling  when  my  own  death-hour  comes — 
eager,  intense,  glad  curiosity  about  the  new, 
strange  world  opening  before  me. 

As  soon  as  we  try  to  peer  further  into  the 
vista  beyond  we  are  up  against  a  difficulty. 
Our  thoughts  must  be  confused  unless  at  start- 
ing we  make  a  clear  distinction  between: 

(i)  Those  who  have  died  in  the  fear  and 
love  of  God;  and 

(ii)  Those  for  whom  we  are  afraid. 
Here  we  shall  assume  that  our  departed  one 


THE  LIFE  BEYOND  49 

died  in  Christ's  faith  and  fear.  Later  we 
shall  think  of  the  others. 

What  can  we  know  about  him?  We  can 
know  little  or  nothing  about  his  outward  en- 
vironment. Even  if  we  were  told  in  words, 
we  have  no  experience  to  help  us  in  realis- 
ing it. 

Imagine  yourself  trying  to  tell  a  blind,  deaf 
man  about  the  lovely  sunset  or  the  music  of 
the  birds.  We,  shut  up  in  these  human  bodies, 
are  the  blind,  deaf  men  in  God's  glorious  uni- 
verse. Some  of  our  comrades  have  moved 
into  the  new  life  beyond,  where  the  eyes  of 
the  blind  are  opened  and  the  ears  of  the  deaf 
are  unstopped.  But  we  have  no  power  of  even 
imagining  what  their  wondrous  experience  is 
like. 

I  suppose  that  is  the  reason  why  we  have 
no  description  of  Paradise  or  Heaven  except 
in  earthly  imagery  of  golden  streets  and 
gates  of  pearl.  I  suppose  that  is  why  St. 
Paul  could  not  utter  what  he  saw  when  in 
some  trance  condition  he  was  caught  up  into 
Paradise.  I  suppose,  too,  that  was  why 
Lazarus  could  tell  nothing  of  his  marvellous 
four  days  in  the  Unseen. 

Be  content,  then,  with  what  you  can  know. 
Don't  cry   for  the   moon.     Follow   your  de- 


50      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

parted  in  thought  and  realise  what  Scripture 
teaches  you  about  him. 

What  are  we  taught  about  him? 

First  that  it  is  a  vivid,  conscious  life  into 
which  he  has  gone. 

There  are  some  passages  In  Scripture  which 
speak  of  death  as  sleep,  and  which  taken 
alone  might  suggest  a  long  unconsciousness, 
a  sort  of  Rip  Van  Winkle  life,  sleeping  for 
thousands  of  years  and  waking  up  in  a  mo- 
ment at  the  Judgment  Day,  feeling  as  if  there 
had  been  no  interval  between.  But  a  little 
thought  will  show  it  is  a  mere  figure  of  speech 
taken  from  the  sleeping  appearance  of  the 
body.  "The  sleep  of  death"  is  a  very  natural 
expression  to  use  as  one  looks  on  the  calm, 
peaceful  face  after  life's  fitful  fever  and  the 
long  pain  and  sickness  of  the  death-bed.  But 
no  one  can  study  the  Bible  references  to  the 
life  beyond  without  seeing  that  it  cannot  be 
a  life  of  sleep  or  unconsciousness.  "Shall  we 
sleep  between  death  and  the  judgment?"  asks 
Tertullian.  "Why,  souls  do  not  sleep  even 
when  men  are  alive.  It  is  the  province  of 
bodies  to  sleep."  This  sleep  theory  has  al- 
ways been  condemned  whenever  the  Church 
has  pronounced  on  it.  Even  the  Reformers 
declare  it  at  variance  with  Holy  Scripture,  in 


THE  LIFE  BEYOND  51 

spite  of  the  strong  feeling  in  its  favour  in 
their  day/ 

You  who  have  followed  thus  far  need  no 
proof  as  to  the  teaching  of  Scripture  that  the 
Waiting  Life  before  the  Judgment  into  which 
your  dear  ones  have  gone  is  no  unconscious 
sleep,  but  a  real,  vivid,  conscious  life.  So 
vivid  that  our  Lord's  Spirit  is  said  to  have 
been  quickened,  made  more  alive,  as  He 
passed  in.  So  vivid  that  the  men  of  the  old 
world  could  listen  to  His  preaching.  So  vivid 
that  Moses  and  Elias — those  eager,  impetuous 
leaders — in  that  wondrous  life  could  not  be 
held  by  its  bonds,  but  broke  through  to  stand 
on  the  mountain  with  Christ  a  thousand  years 
after  their  death.  So  vivid  that  Lazarus 
(whom  our  Lord  describes  as  in  Abraham's 
bosom)  is  depicted  as  living  a  full,  clear,  in- 
telligent life,  and  Dives  as  thinking  anxiously 
about  his  five  brothers  on  earth. 

That  was  surely  no  unconscious  life  which 
St.  Paul  saw  when  he  was  caught  up  into 
Paradise  and  heard  unspeakable  things,  nor 
was  it  a  blank  unconsciousness  that  he  looked 

^  The  "39  Articles"  were  originally  42,  and  the  40th 
ran :  "They  which  say  that  the  souls  of  those  who  depart 
hence  do  sleep,  being  without  all  sense,  feeling,  or  per- 
ceiving till  the  Day  of  Judgment,  ...  do  utterly  dis- 
sent from  the  right  belief  declared  to  us  in  Holy 
Scripture." 


52      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

■for  in  his  desire  "to  depart  and  be  with  Christ, 
which  is  far  better"  (Phil.  i.  23). 

Or  glance  again  at  the  story  of  our  Lord 
and  the  thief  on  the  cross.  "To-day,"  said 
Jesus,  "thou  shalt  be  with  Me."  To-night, 
when  our  dead  bodies  are  hanging  upon  the 
cross,  you  and  I  will  be  together.  Which 
surely  means  we  shall  be  conscious  of  each 
other  as  the  two  who  hung  dying  together  on 
Calvary. 

Beyond  all  question  God  has  revealed  to  you 
plainly  enough  that  your  beloved  has  gone 
into  a  full,  vivid,  conscious  life.  He  is  more 
alive  to-day  than  he  ever  was  on  earth. 

What  follows?  This.  If  I  am  fully  con- 
scious, what  am  I  conscious  of?  Surely,  first 
of  all  I  must  be  conscious  of  myself,  con- 
scious of  the  continuity  of  my  personal  iden- 
tity, conscious  of  the  continuity  of  my  per- 
sonal character.  I  must  feel  that  I  am  the 
same  "I,"  I  am  still  "myself."  You  remem- 
ber what  our  Lord  said  from  the  other  side 
of  the  grave:  "Handle  Me  and  see  it  is  I 
Myself." 

It  is  I  myself,  the  very  same  self.  It  is 
they  themselves,  the  very  same  selves  whom 
I  loved  and  who  loved  me  so  dearly.  In  that 
solemn  hour  after  death,  believe  it,  your  boy, 


THE  LIFE  BEYOND  53 

your  wife,  your  husband,  who  is  experiencing 
the  startling  revelations  of  the  new  life,  is 
feeling  that  life  as  an  unbroken  continuance 
of  the  life  begun  on  earth.  Only  the  environ- 
ment is  changed.  He  feels  himself  the  same 
boy  or  man  that  he  was  an  hour  ago,  with 
the  same  character,  aspirations,  desires,  the 
same  love  and  courage  and  hope.  But  oh, 
with  what  a  different  view  of  all  things!  How 
clearly  he  recognises  God's  love  and  holiness! 
How  clearly  he  sees  himself — ^his  whole  past 
life!  If  ever  he  cared  for  Christ  and  His  will, 
how  longingly,  wonderingly,  he  is  reaching 
out  to  Him!  H  ever  he  loved  you  tenderly 
on  earth,  how  deeply  and  tenderly  he  is  lov- 
ing you  to-day! 

What  else  have  you  learned?  That  he  re- 
members CLEARLY  the  old  life  and  the  old 
home  and  the  old  comrades  and  the  old  scenes 
on  earth.  There  is  no  conjecturing  about  that. 
That  goes  without  saying  if  "I"  am  the  same 
"I"  in  that  world.  Personal  identity  of  course 
postulates  memory  which  binds  into  one  the 
old  life  and  the  new.  And  the  Bible  takes 
that  for  granted.  We  saw  that  Lazarus  re- 
membered Dives,  and  that  Dives  remembered 
Lazarus  and  remembered  his  old  home  and 
the  five  young  brothers   who  grew  up  with 


54      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

him.  He  remembers  that  they  have  grown 
to  be  selfish  men  Hke  himself,  and  is  troubled 
for  them.  And  Abraham  assumes  it  as  a  mat- 
ter of  course :  "My  son,  remember  that  thou 
in  thy  lifetime,"  etc.  Our  Lord  comes  back 
from  death  remembering  all  the  past  as  if 
death  made  no  chasm  at  all  in  His  memory. 
"Go  and  meet  Me  in  Galilee,"  He  says.  "Lo, 
I  have  told  you"  (before  I  died).  The  re- 
deemed in  the  future  life  are  represented  as 
remembering  and  praising  God  who  had  re- 
deemed them  from  their  sins  on  earth. 

So  you  may  be  quite  sure  that  your  dear 
one  is  remembering  you  and  storing  up  in  his 
memory  all  your  love  in  the  past. 

And  he  has  taken  with  him  all  the  treasures 
of  mind  and  soul  which  by  God's  grace  he 
has  won  for  himself  on  earth.  A  man  can 
take  nothing  of  the  external  things — of  gold 
or  lands.  Nothing  of  what  he  has,  but  all  of 
what  he  is — all  that  he  has  gained  in  him- 
self. The  treasures  of  memory,  of  disci- 
plined powers,  of  enlarged  capacities,  of  a 
pure  and  loving  heart.  All  the  enrichment  of 
the  mind  by  study,  all  the  love  of  man,  all  the 
love  of  God,  all  the  ennobling  of  character 
which  has  come  through  the  struggle  after 
right  and  duty.     These  are  the  true  treasures 


THE  LIFE  BEYOND  55 

which  go  on  with  us  into   that  land  where 
neither  rust  nor  moth  doth  corrupt. 

And  he  is  "with  Christ." 

The  Bible  teaches  that  the  faithful  who 
have  died  in  Christ  are  happy  and  blest  in 
Paradise,  even  though  the  Final  Heaven  and 
the  Beatific  Vision  are  still  but  things  to  be 
longed  for  far  off  in  the  future.  Lazarus  is 
"comforted"  after  his  hard  life  on  earth. 
"The  souls  of  the  righteous  are  in  the  hands 
of  God;  there  shall  no  torment  touch  them." 
"Blessed  are  the  dead  which  die  in  the  Lord 
.  .  .  they  rest  from  their  labours."  But,  best 
of  all,  it  assures  us  that  they  are  with  Christ. 
"Lord  Jesus,  receive  my  spirit,"  the  dying 
Stephen  prayed  as  he  was  passing  into  the 
Unseen.  They  are  "absent  from  the  body," 
says  St.  Paul,  "at  home  with  the  Lord." 
They  "depart  to  be  with  Christ,  which  is  far 
better." 

"With  Christ."  One  has  to  write  carefully 
here.  The  full  vision  of  the  divine  glory  and 
goodness  and  love  is  reserved  for  the  final 
stage  of  existence  in  Heaven,  where  nothing 
that  defileth  shall  enter  in,  whereas  this  Inter- 
mediate Life  is  one  with  many  imperfections 
and  faults,  quite  unready  for  that  vision  of 
glory.    But,  for  all  that,  St.  Paul  believed  that 


56      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

the  presence  of  Christ  was  vouchsafed  in  that 
Waiting  Land,  in  some  such  way,  we  may- 
suppose,  as  on  earth  long  ago.  Only  an  im- 
perfect revelation  of  the  Son  of  God.  And 
yet — and  yet — oh,  how  one  longs  for  it! 
Think  of  being  near  Him,  even  in  some  such 
relation  as  were  the  disciples  long  ago! 

"I  think  when  I  read  that  sweet  story  of  old, 
When  Jesus  was  here  among  men, 
How  He  called  little  children  as  lambs  to  His  fold, 
I  should  like  to  have  been  with  Him  then !" 

Yes,  St.  Paul  seems  to  say,  you  shall  be 
with  Him,  you  shall  have  that  longing  grati- 
fied in  some  measure  even  before  you  go  to 
Heaven.  So  that  Paradise,  poor  and  imper- 
fect as  it  is  compared  with  the  Heaven  be- 
yond, is  surely  a  state  to  be  greatly  desired. 

I  can  imagine  some  mourner  shrinking  from 
the  thought  that  Paradise,  into  which  his  dear 
one  has  gone,  is  not  the  final  Heaven.  Nay, 
shrink  not.  Paradise  means  the  Park  of  God, 
the  Garden  of  God,  the  place  of  rest  and  peace 
and  refreshing  shade.  The  park  is  not  the 
palace,  but  it  is  the  precincts  of  the  palace. 
Paradise  is  not  Heaven,  but  it  is  the  court- 
yard of  Heaven.  And  (the  dearest,  tenderest 
assurance  of  all)  they  are  with  Christ.  Is  not 
that  sufficient  answer  to  many  questions?  At 
any  rate  the  Bible  definitely  teaches  that. 


The 
VI  Communion  of  Saints 

SHALL     WE      KNOW      ONE     ANOTHER     IN 
THAT   LIFE?      Why   not ?      As    George 
Macdonald  somewhere  pertinently  asks, 
"Shall  we  be  greater  fools  in  Paradise  than 
we  are  here?" 

This  is  a  perfectly  apt  retort,  and  not  at  all 
flippant,  as  it  may  seem  at  first.  It  is  based 
on  the  belief  suggested  by  common  sense  and 
confirmed  by  Scripture  that  our  life  there  will 
be  the  natural  continuous  development  of  our 
life  here,  and  not  some  utterly  unconnected 
existence.  If  consciousness,  personal  identity, 
character,  love,  memory,  fellowship,  inter- 
course go  on  in  that  life,  why  should  there 
be  a  question  raised  about  knowing  one 
another  ? 

If  I  am  the  same  "I,"  the  same  person,  still 
alive,  still  conscious,  still  thinking,  still  re- 
membering, still  loving,  still  longing  for  my 
dear  ones,  still  capable  of  intercourse  with 
others,  why  may  I  not  without  definite  proof 
assume  the  fact  of  recognition?  Surely  it 
should  require  strong  evidence  to  make  me 
57 


58      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

believe  the  contrary.  It  is  one  thing  to  avoid 
reckless  assertions  without  any  foundation,  it 
is  quite  another  thing  to  have  so  little  trust 
in  God  that  we  are  afraid  to  make  a  fair  in- 
ference such  as  we  would  unhesitatingly  make 
in  like  conditions  here — just  because  it  seems 
to  us  "too  good  to  be  true."  Nothing  is  too 
good  to  be  true  where  God  is  concerned. 

Why,  even  if  the  Bible  were  to  give  you 
no  hint  of  it,  do  you  not  see  that  the  deepest, 
noblest  instincts  that  God  has  implanted  in  us 
cry  out  for  recognition  of  our  departed?  and 
where  God  is  concerned  it  is  not  too  much  to 
say  that  the  deepest,  noblest  instincts  are,  in 
a  sense,  prophecies.  This  passionate  affection, 
the  noblest  thing  that  God  has  implanted  in 
us,  makes  it  impossible  to  believe  that  we 
should  be  but  solitary,  isolated  spirits  amongst 
a  crowd  of  others  whom  we  did  not  know — 
that  we  should  live  in  the  society  of  happy 
souls  hereafter  and  never  know  that  the  spirit 
next  us  was  that  of  a  mother  or  husband  or 
friend  or  child.  We  know  that  the  Paradise 
and  earth  lives  come  from  the  same  God,  who 
is  the  same  always.  Into  this  life  He  never 
sends  us  alone.  There  is  the  mother's  love 
waiting  and  the  family  affection  around  us; 
and,  as  we  grow  older,  love  and   friendship 


THE  COMMUNION  OF  SAINTS      59 

and  association  with  others  are  one  of  the 
great  needs  and  pleasures  of  life,  and  one  of 
the  chief  means  of  training  the  higher  side  of 
us.  Unless  His  method  changes  we  may 
surely  hope  that  He  will  do  something  similar 
hereafter,  for  love  is  the  plant  that  must  over- 
top all  others  in  the  whole  Kingdom  of  God. 
Again,   love  and   friendship  must  be  love 

AND    FRIENDSHIP    FOR    SOME    ONE.       H    WC    do 

not  know  any  one,  then  we  cannot  love,  and 
human  love  must  die  without  an  object.  But 
the  Bible  makes  it  a  main  essential  of  the  re- 
ligious life  that  "he  that  loveth  God  loveth 
his  brother  also." 

If  we  shall  not  know  one  another,  why 
then  this  undying  memory  of  departed  ones, 
this  aching  void  that  is  never  filled  on  earth? 
Alas  for  us!  for  we  are  worse  off  than  the 
lower  animals.  The  calf  is  taken  from  the 
cow,  the  kittens  are  taken  from  their  mother, 
and  in  a  few  days  they  are  forgotten.  But 
the  poor  human  mother  never  forgets.  When 
her  head  is  bowed  with  age,  when  she  has  for- 
gotten nearly  all  else  on  earth,  you  can  bring 
the  tears  into  her  eyes  by  speaking  of  the  child 
that  died  in  her  arms  forty  years  ago.  Will 
God  disappoint  that  tender  love,  that  one  su- 
preme thing  which  is  "the  most  like  God 
within  the  soul"? 


6o      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

There  can  be  no  real  reason,  I  repeat,  for 
doubting  the  fact  of  recognition,  unless  the 
Bible  should  distinctly  state  the  contrary. 
And,  so  far  from  doing  this,  the  Bible,  in  its 
very  few  references  to  the  hereafter  life,  al- 
ways seems  to  assume  the  fact,  and  never  in 
any  way  contradicts  it. 

Notice  first  the  curiously  persistent  formula 
in  which  Old  Testament  chroniclers  speak  of 
death.  "He  died  in  a  good  old  age  and  was 
gathered  unto  his  people,  and  they  buried 
him."  "Gathered  unto  his  people"  can  hardly 
mean  burial  with  his  people,  for  the  burial  is 
mentioned  after  it.  It  comes  between  the 
dying  and  the  burial.  And  I  note  that  even 
at  Moses'  burial  on  the  lone  mountain-top  this 
phrase  is  solemnly  used :  "The  Lord  said  unto 
him,  Get  thee  up  into  the  mount,  and  die  in 
the  mount,  and  be  gathered  to  thy  peo- 
ple." Miriam  was  buried  in  the  distant 
desert,  Aaron's  body  lay  on  the  slopes  of 
Mount  Hor,  and  the  wise  little  mother  who 
made  the  ark  of  bulrushes  long  ago  had  found 
a  grave,  I  suppose,  in  the  brick-fields  of 
Egypt.  Did  it  not  mean  that  he  came  back 
to  them  all  in  the  Life  Unseen  when  he  was 
"gathered  to  his  people"? 

David  seemed  to  think  that  he  would  know 


THE  COMMUNION  OF  SAINTS      6i 

his  dead  child :  "I  shall  go  to  him,  but  he  shall 
not  return  to  me." 

Our  Lord  assumes  that  Dives  and  Lazarus 
knew  each  other.  And  in  another  passage  He 
uses  a  very  homely  illustration  of  a  friendly 
gathering  when  He  speaks  of  those  who  shall 
"sit  down  with  Abraham  and  Isaac  and  Jacob 
in  the  kingdom."  And  again,  in  His  advice 
about  the  right  use  of  riches :  "Make  to  your- 
selves friends  by  the  means  of  the  mammon 
of  unrighteousness,  that  when  ye  die  they  may 
receive  you  into  the  everlasting  habitations" 
(Luke  xvi.  9).  Surely  that  at  least  suggests 
recognition  and  a  pleasant  welcoming  on  the 
other  side.  I  remember  well  how,  in  the  pain 
of  a  great  bereavement,  His  words  to  the 
penitent  thief  came  into  my  life  like  a  mes- 
sage from  the  Beyond :  "To-day  shalt  thou  be 
with  Me  in  Paradise."  H  anybody  knew, 
surely  Jesus  knew.  If  His  words  meant  any- 
thing, surely  they  meant  we  shall  be  conscious 
of  each  other,  we  shall  know  each  other  as 
did  the  two  friendless  ones  who  hung  on  the 
cross  together. 

Then  I  see  St.  Paul  (though  he  is  referring 
to  the  later  stage  of  existence)  comforting 
bereaved  mourners  with  the  thought  of  meet- 
ing those  whom  Christ  shall  bring  with  Him. 
Where  would  be  the  comfort  of   it   if  they 


62      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

should  not  know  them?  He  expects  to  meet 
his  converts  and  present  them  to  Christ.  How 
could  he  say  this  if  he  thought  he  would  not 
know  them? 

I  wonder  if  anybody  really  doubts  it  after 
all.  Just  think  of  it!  With  Christ  in  Para- 
dise, and  not  knowing  or  loving  any  comrade 
soul!  Is  that  possible  in  the  land  of  love? 
With  our  dear  ones  in  Paradise,  and  never  a 
thrill  of  recognition  as  we  touch  in  spiritual 
intercourse  the  mother,  or  wife,  or  husband, 
or  child  for  whose  presence  we  are  longing! 
Cannot  you  imagine  our  wondering  joy  when 
our  questionings  are  set  at  rest?  Cannot  you 
imagine  the  Lord  in  His  tender  reproach,  **0 
thou  of  little  faith,  wherefore  didst  thou 
doubt?" 

When  a  mother  asks  how  she  can  know  him 
who  died  as  a  child  twenty  years  ago,  one 
feels  that  recognition  must  be  something 
spiritual  and  not  depending  on  visible  shape. 
Even  here  on  earth  much  of  our  recognition 
is  spiritual.  Soul  recognises  soul.  We  rec- 
ognise in  some  degree  good  and  evil  character 
of  souls  even  through  the  coarse  covering  of 
the  body.  We  instinctively,  as  we  say,  trust 
or  distrust  people  on  first  appearance.  Or, 
again,  a  slight  young  stripling  goes  away  to 


THE  COMMUNION  OF  SAINTS      63 

India  and  returns  in  twenty  years  a  big, 
bearded,  broad-shouldered  man,  with  prac- 
tically no  outward  resemblance  to  the  boy  that 
went  away.  But  even  though  he  strive  to  con- 
ceal his  identity  he  cannot  hide  it  long-  from 
his  mother.  She  looks  into  his  eyes  and  her 
soul  leaps  out  to  him.  Call  it  instinct,  insight, 
intuition,  sympathy — what  you  please — it  is 
the  spiritual  vision,  soul  recognising  soul.  If 
that  spiritual  vision  apart  from  bodily  shape 
plays  so  great  a  part  in  recognition  here,  may 
it  not  be  all-sufficient  there?  In  that  life 
where  there  is  consciousness,  character,  mem- 
ory, love,  longing  for  our  dear  ones,  and  power 
of  communication,  is  it  conceivable  that  we 
should  have  intercourse  with  our  loved  and 
longed-for,  without  any  thrill  of  recognition? 
Surely  not.     Instinctively  we  shall  know. 

"It  was  not,  mother,  that  I  knew  thy  face — 
It  was  my  heart  that  cried  out  Mother  1" 

But  I  think  there  is  even  a  more  probable 
answer:  That  it  is  not  you  who  will  have  to 
do  the  recognising;  at  any  rate  that  you  will 
not  be  the  first  with  it.  If  it  be  true,  as  we 
have  reason  to  believe,  that  your  dear  one 
there  watches  your  life  on  earth,  of  course 
he  would  know  you  at  once.  While,  year  by 
year,  you  have  been  changing  from  youth  to 


64      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

old  age  he  has  been  near  you.  He  knows  you 
as  famiHarly  as  if  he  had  been  on  earth  be- 
side you.  And  whatever  change  has  passed 
on  him  in  his  new  life,  surely  he  too  will  be 
easier  to  recognise  when  he  has  claimed  you 
first. 

We  pass  on  to  consider  the  relations  be- 
tween ourselves  and  our  departed  ones.  Do 
they  knew  now  of  our  life  on  earth?  Can 
there  be  between  us  comradeship  in  any  sense  ? 
Can  there  be  love  and  care  and  sympathy  and 
prayer  between  us  on  these  two  sides  of  the 
grave,  as  there  is  between  friends  on  earth  on 
the  two  sides  of  the  Atlantic. 

The  Church  says  yes,  and  calls  it  in  her 
Creed  the  Communion  of  Saints.  The  Com- 
munion of  Saints — a  very  grand  name,  but  it 
means  only  a  very  simple  thing — ^just  loving 
sympathy  between  us  and  these  elder  brothers 
and  sisters  beyond  the  grave. 

You  see  that  it  is  a  prominent  doctrine  of 
the  Church's  Creed,  and,  rightly  understood, 
it  is  a  very  beautiful  and  touching  doctrine — 
not  only  because  of  the  union  of  fellowship 
with  our  departed,  but  especially  because  the 
bond  of  that  union  and  fellowship  is  our  dear 
Lord  Himself,  whom  we  and  they  alike  love 
and  thank  and  praise  and  pray  to  and  wor- 


THE  COMMUNION  OF  SAINTS      65 

ship,  and  from  whom  we  and  they  alike  de- 
rive the  Divine  sustenance  of  our  souls. 

Yes,  you  say,  that  is  a  beautiful  thought. 
But  is  that  all  ?  My  poor  heart  is  craving  for 
more  communion  than  that.  Do  they  know 
or  care  about  my  love  and  sorrow  to-day? 
And  are  they  helping  me?  Are  they  praying 
for  me  to  that  dear  Lord  whom  we  both  love 
— in  whose  presence  we  both  stand  to-day? 
And  can  I  do  anything  for  them  on  my  side 
in  this  "Communion  of  Saints"  ? 

Do  they  pray  for  us  or  help  us  in  any  way? 
Does  any  one  need  to  ask  that  question? 

Since  they  are  with  Christ,  of  course  they 
pray.  The  world  to  come  is  the  very  atmos- 
phere of  prayer.  St.  John  in  his  vision  tells 
of  "the  offering  of  the  golden  vials  full  of 
odours  which  are  the  prayers  of  the  saints" 
(Rev.  V.  8).  And  again,  three  chapters  later, 
the  angel  stood  to  offer  the  prayers  of  all 
saints  upon  the  golden  altar. 

Can  you  imagine  your  mother,  who  never 
went  to  bed  here  without  earnest  prayer  for 
her  boy,  going  into  that  life  with  full  con- 
sciousness and  full  memory  of  the  dear  old 
home  on  earth,  and  never  a  prayer  for  her  boy 
rising  to  the  altar  of  God? 


66      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

Why,  even  the  selfish  Dives,  after  death, 
could  not  help  praying  for  his  brothers! 

Ay,  she  is  praying  for  you.  I  think 
amongst  the  most  precious  prayers  before  the 
golden  altar  are  the  mother's  prayers  for  her 
boy  who  is  left  behind  on  earth. 

But,  you  say,  She  does  not  know  anything 
about  my  life  or  my  needs  on  earth.  Even 
if  she  did  not  know,  she  would  surely  pray 
for  you.  But  I  am  pretty  sure  that  she 
does  know.  There  are  several  hints  in  Scrip- 
ture to  suggest  that  she  does  know — ^hints  so 
strong  that  if  you  are  doing  anything  now 
that  she  would  like,  I  should  advise  you  to 
keep  on  doing  it,  and  if  you  are  doing  any- 
thing now  that  you  would  not  wish  her  to 
know,  I  would  advise  you  to  stop  doing  it. 

Our  Lord  represents  Abraham  as  knowing 
all  about  Moses  and  the  prophets,  who  came  a 
thousand  years  after  his  time  (Luke  xvi.  29). 

Our  Lord  distinctly  tells  the  Jews  that 
Abraham  in  that  life  knew  all  about  His  mis- 
sion on  earth.  "Your  Father  Abraham  re- 
joiced to  see  My  day,  and  he  saw  it  and  was 
glad"  (John  viii.  56). 

At  the  Transfiguration,  too,  Moses  and 
Elias  came  out  from  that  Waiting  Life  to 
speak  with  Christ  of  His  decease  which  He 


THE  COMMUNION  OF  SAINTS      67 

should  accomplish  at  Jerusalem.  Does  it  not 
suggest  at  once  that  they  and  their  great  com- 
rades within  the  veil  were  watching  eagerly 
and  knowing  all  about  the  life  of  Christ  and 
the  great  crisis  of  man's  redemption  toward 
which  they  had  been  working  on  earth  long 
years  ago? 

The  writer  of  the  Epistle  tO'  the  Hebrews 
apparently  believed  that  our  departed  ones 
were  watching  our  course,  for  after  a  long 
list  of  the  great  departed  heroes  of  faith  in 
olden  time  he  writes  to  encourage  us  in  the 
race  on  earth :  "Seeing  that  we  are  encom- 
passed about  with  so  great  a  cloud  of  wit- 
nesses, let  us  lay  aside  every  weight,  and  run 
with  patience  the  race  that  is  set  before  us" 
(Heb.  xii.). 

But,  somebody  says,  she  might  not  be  quite 
happy  if  she  knew  all  that  her  children  had 
to  go  through.  Seeing  that  at  any  rate  she 
remembers  them,  do  you  think  she  would  be 
more  happy  if  she  knew  that  they  might  have 
to  go  through  troubles  of  which  she  could  not 
learn  anything?  Put  yourself  in  the  place  of 
any  mother  that  you  know,  and  ask  if  it  would 
make  her  any  happier  to  stop  all  letters  about 
her  children  who  she  felt  might  be  in  danger 
or  trouble.     Are  you  quite  sure  that  in  that 


68      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

spirit  life  a  peaceful  contentment  like  that  of 
the  cow  who  forgets  her  calf  is  the  highest 
thing  to  be  desired?  The  higher  any  soul 
grows  on  earth  the  less  can  it  escape  unselfish 
sorrow  for  the  sake  of  others.  Must  it  not 
be  so  in  that  land  also?  Surely  the  Highest 
Himself  must  have  more  sorrow  than  any  one 
else  for  the  sins  and  troubles  of  men.  Have 
you  ever  thought  of  that  "eternal  pain"  of 
God?  H  there  be  joy  in  His  presence  over 
one  sinner  that  repenteth,  must  there  not  be 
pain  in  His  presence  over  one  that  repenteth 
not? 

There  are  surely  higher  things  in  God's 
plans  for  His  saints  than  mere  selfish  happi- 
ness and  content.  There  is  the  blessedness 
that  comes  of  sympathy  with  Him  over  hu- 
man sorrow  or  pain.  We  but  degrade  that 
thought  of  the  blessedness  of  the  redeemed 
when  we  desire  that  they  should  escape 
that. 

And  always  remember  for  your  comfort 
that  in  that  kindly  world  so  interested  in  our 
world  she  knows  that  her  Lord  is  caring  about 
your  future  even  more  than  she  is.  It  is  a 
strong  confirmation  of  this  belief  when  I  find 
it  the  belief  of  the  great  bishops  and  teachers 
of  the  early  Church  in  its  purest  and  most  lov- 


THE  COMMUNION  OF  SAINTS      69 

ing  days,  the  days  nearest  to  those  of  Christ 
and  His  apostles. 

St.  Cyprian,  the  martyr  bishop  of  Carthage, 
who  was  born  in  the  century  after  St.  John's 
death  (a.d.  200),  made  an  agreement  with  his 
friend  Cornelius  that  whichever  of  them  died 
first  should  in  the  Unseen  Land  remember  in 
prayer  him  who  was  left  behind, 

St.  Gregory  Nazianzen  is  preaching  the 
funeral  sermon  of  St.  Basil.  "He  still  prays 
for  the  people,"  he  says,  "for  he  did  not  so 
leave  us  as  to  have  left  us  altogether."  And 
in  his  funeral  sermon  over  his  own  father: 
"I  am  satisfied  that  he  accomplishes  there  now 
by  his  prayers  more  than  he  ever  did  by  his 
teaching,  just  in  proportion  as  he  approaches 
nearer  to  God  after  having  shaken  off  the 
fetters  of  his  body." 

I  could  give  you  long  lists  of  references 
of  this  kind  showing  the  belief  of  the  early 
Church. 

But  sympathy  and  prayer  must  not  be  on 
one  side  only.  It  must  be  mutual  in  the  Com- 
munion of  Saints — they  remembering  and  lov- 
ing and  thinking  about  us,  we  remembering 
and  loving  and  thinking  about  them;  they 
asking  from  their  Lord  blessing  for  us,  we 
asking   from   Him   blessing   for  them.     For 


70      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

surely  they  are  not  above  wanting  His  bless- 
ing still — not  even  the  best  of  them:  though 
safe  with  Him,  though  forgiven  their  sins, 
they  are  still  imperfect,  still  needing  to  grow 
in  grace,  in  purification,  in  fitness  for  the 
Final  Heaven  by  and  by.  And  we  can  help 
their  growth  as  they  can  help  ours. 

I  think  we  should  all  be  happier  and  better, 
I  think  the  Unseen  World  would  come  back 
more  clearly  on  our  horizon,  if  we  kept  our 
dear  ones  in  our  prayers  as  we  used  to  do 
before  they  died.  Do  not  keep  any  hidden 
chambers  in  your  heart  shut  out  from  Christ. 
Bring  your  dear  departed  ones  to  Him  as  you 
bring  all  else  to  Him.  He  knows  what  is  best 
for  them.  Pray  only  for  that.  Pray  "Lord, 
help  them  to  grow  closer  to  Thee.  Help  them, 
if  it  may  be,  to  help  others,  and  make  them 
happy  in  Thy  great  kingdom  until  we  meet 
again."  Pray  something  like  that.  Oh,  how 
can  you  help  doing  it,  if  you  love  them  and 
believe  in  prayer! 

"How  can  I  cease  to  pray  for  thee?    Somewhere 
In  God's  wide  universe  thou  art  to-day. 
Can  He  not  reach  thee  with  His  tender  care? 
Can  He  not  hear  me  when  for  thee  I  pray? 
Somewhere  thou  livest  and  hast  need  of  Him, 
Somewhere  thy  soul  sees  higher  heights  to  climb. 
And  somewhere,  too,  there  may  be  valleys  dim 
Which  thou  must  pass  to  reach  the  heights  sublime. 


THE  COMMUNION  OF  SAINTS      71 

Then  all  the  more  because  thou  canst  not  hear 
Poor  human  words  of  blessmg  which  I  pray. 
O  true,  brave  heart,  God  bless  thee,  whereso'er 
In  God's  wide  universe  thou  art  to-day !" 

There  is  very  much  more  to  learn  if  there 
were  space  for  it  here.  Hints  as  to  growth 
and  purification  in  that  life.  Hints  as  to  un- 
selfish ministry  for  others.  Questions  as  to 
the  Judgment  and  the  Far  Hereafter  and 
what  men  ought  to  believe  about  Heaven  and 
Hell.  But  probably  I  have  said  enough  to 
set  you  thinking  and,  I  hope,  to  set  you  study- 
ing the  subject  for  yourselves. 


"For  the  Love 
VII  of  God  Is  Broader—" 

UP  to  this  we  have  been  ignoring  a  large 
proportion  of  those  who  have  died. 
To  avoid  misunderstanding  we  have 
kept  in  view  those  only  of  whom  we  had  hopes 
that  they  died  in  the  fear  and  love  of  God. 
But  there  is  no  evading  the  thought  that  be- 
tween these  and  the  utterly  reprobate  there 
are  many  who  belong  to  neither  class — mixed 
characters  in  all  varying  degrees  of  good  or 
evil.  Of  many  of  them  it  could  be  said  that 
those  who  knew  them  best  saw  much  that  was 
good  and  lovable  in  them.  But  it  could  not 
be  said  that  they  had  consciously  and  definitely 
chosen  for  Christ. 

They  must  form  the  majority  of  those  who 
die.  Therefore  one  cannot  help  wondering 
about  them.  One  day  death  overtook  them. 
The  thought  of  them  comes  forcibly  when 
some  morning  the  newspapers  startle  us  with 
the  story  of  an  awful  carnage  in  which  thou- 
sands have  passed  out  of  life  in  a  moment,  and 
the  horror  of  the  catastrophe  is  deepened  by  the 
72 


'TOR  THE  LOVE  OF  GOD—"        73 

thought  that  they  have  been  called  away  sud- 
denly, unprepared. 

What  o£  their  position  in  the  Life  Beyond? 
Our  Christian  charity  prompts  us  to  hope  the 
best  for  them,  all  the  more  because  they  have 
died  fighting  bravely  for  their  country.  But 
,are  vi^e  justified  in  hoping?  It  is  impossible 
for  thoughtful,  sympathetic  men  to  evade  that 
question.  It  is  cowardly  to  evade  it.  At  any 
rate,  in  thinking  of  the  World  of  the  De- 
parted, we  can  hardly  pass  over  altogether  the 
thought  of  the  majority,  and  it  cannot  be 
wrong  for  us  to  think  about  them  humbly  and 
reverently. 

First,  I  point  out  to  you  the  solemn  respon- 
sibility of  this  earth  life,  in  which  Acts  make 
Habits,  and  Habits  make  Character,  and  Char- 
acter makes  Destiny.  I  am  about  to  point  out 
that  in  a  very  real  sense  this  life  is  the  pro- 
bation time  for  man.  But  this  does  not  close 
the  question  of  the  poor  bereaved  mother 
weeping  for  her  dead  son:  "If  any  soul  has 
not  in  penitence  and  faith  definitely  accepted 
Jesus  Christ  in  this  life,  is  it  for  ever  impos- 
sible that  he  may  do  so  in  any  other  life?" 

I  answer  unhesitatingly,  God  forbid!  else 
what  of  all  the  dead  children  down  through 
the  ages,  and  all  the  dead  idiots,  and  all  the 


74      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

millions  of  dead  heathen,  and  all  the  poor  sin- 
ners in  Christian  lands  who  in  their  dreary, 
dingy  lives  had  never  any  fair  chance  of 
knowing  their  Lord  in  a  way  that  would  lead 
them  to  love  Him,  and  who  have  never  even 
thought  about  accepting  or  rejecting  Him? 
Shall  not  the  Judge  of  all  the  earth  do  right? 
Shall  not  the  loving  Father  do  His  best  for 
all?  Our  Lord  knew  that  if  the  mighty  works 
done  in  Capernaum  had  been  done  in  Tyre 
and  Sidon  they  would  have  repented.  Does 
He  not  there  suggest  that  He  would  take 
thought  for  those  men  of  Tyre  and  Sidon  in 
the  Unseen  Land?  Does  He  not  know  the 
same  of  many  gone  into  that  Unseen  Life 
from  heathen  lands  and  Christian  lands,  who 
would  have  loved  Him  if  they  knew  Him  as 
He  really  is,  and  who  have  but  begun  to  know 
Him  in  the  world  of  the  dead — of  many  who 
in  their  ignorance  have  tried  to  respond  to 
the  dim  light  of  Conscience  within,  and  only 
learned  within  the  veil  really  to  know  Him, 
the  Lord  of  the  Conscience,  "the  light  which 
lighteth  every  man  that  cometh  into  the 
world"   (John  i.  9). 

Here  is  no  question  of  encouraging  godless 
men  with  the  hope  of  a  new  probation.  Here 
is  no  question  of  men  wilfully  rejecting  Christ. 
The  merry,  thoughtless  child — the  imbecile — 


"FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  GOD—"        75 

the  heathen — had  no  thought  of  rejecting 
Christ.  The  poor  sinner  in  Christian  lands 
brought  up  in  evil  surroundings,  who,  though 
he  had  heard  of  Christ,  yet  saw  no  trace  of 
Christ  in  his  dreary  life,  cannot  be  said  to  have 
rejected  Christ.  The  honest  sceptic,  who  in 
the  last  generation  had  been  taught  as  a 
prominent  truth  of  Christianity  that  God  de- 
crees certain  men  to  Eternal  Heaven  and  cer- 
tain men  to  Eternal  Hell,  not  for  any  good 
or  evil  they  have  done,  but  to  show  His 
power  and  glory,  and  who  had  therefore  in 
obedience  to  conscience  frankly  rejected 
Christianity — can  he  be  said  to  have  rejected 
Christ? 

The  possibility  in  this  life  of  putting  oneself 
outside  the  pale  of  salvation  is  quite  awful 
enough,  without  our  making  it  worse.  It  is 
not  for  us  to  judge  who  is  outside  the  pale 
of  salvation,  nor  to  limit  the  love  of  God  by 
our  little  shibboleths.  It  is  on  a  man's  will, 
not  on  his  knowledge  or  ignorance,  that  des- 
tiny depends.  God  only  can  judge  that.  All 
the  subtle  influences  which  go  to  make  char- 
acter are  known  to  Him  alone.  He  alone  can 
weigh  the  responsibility  of  the  will  in  any  par- 
ticular case.  And  surely  we  know  Him  well 
enough  humbly  to  trust  His  love  to  the  utter- 
most for  every  soul  whom  He  has  created. 


76      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

But  this  hope  must  not  ignore  the  solemn 
thought  that  in  a  very  real  sense  the  probation 
of  this  life  seems  the  determining  factor  in 
human  destiny — even  for  the  unthinking,  even 
for  the  ignorant — nay,  even  for  the  heathen 
who  could  never  have  heard  of  Christ  here. 
Rightly  understood,  all  that  I  have  said  does 
not  conflict  with  this.  It  may  seem  strange 
at  first  sight  to  think  of  the  heathen  as  having 
any  real  probation  here.  Yet,  mark  it  well, 
it  is  of  this  heathen  man  who  could  not  con- 
sciously have  known  Christ  in  this  life  that 
St.  Paul  implies  that  his  attitude  in  the  Un- 
seen Life  toward  Him  who  is  the  Light  of 
the  world  is  determined  by  his  attitude  in  this 
life  towards  the  imperfect  light  of  conscience 
that  he  has:  "If  the  Gentiles  who  have  not 
the  law  do  by  nature  the  things  contained  in 
the  law,  these  having  not  the  law  are  a  law 
unto  themselves,  which  show  the  works  of  the 
law  written  in  their  hearts,  their  conscience 
bearing  witness"   (Rom.  ii.  14). 

We  may  assume  that  St.  Paul  means  that 
the  heathen  man  who  in  this  life  followed  the 
dim  light  of  his  conscience  is  the  man  who  will 
rejoice  in  the  full  light  when  it  comes,  and 
that  the  man  who  has  been  wilfully  shutting 
out  that  dim  light  of  conscience  here  is 
thereby  rendering  himself  less  capable  of  ac- 


"FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  GOD—"        77 

cepting  the  fuller  light  when  he  meets  it  here- 
after. In  other  words,  this  life  is  his  proba- 
tion— he  is  forming  on  earth  the  moral  bent 
of  his  future  life. 

We  may  assume  the  same  of  men  in  similar 
conditions  in  Christian  lands,  men  brought 
up  amid  ignorance  and  crime,  men  brought 
up  in  infidel  homes,  men  to  whom  Christ  had 
been  so  unattractively  presented  that  they  saw 
no  beauty  in  Him,  men  who  in  the  squalid 
monotony  of  the  struggle  for  bread  had  little 
to  make  them  think  of  Christ  at  all.  They 
all  have  the  light  of  God  in  some  degree,  and, 
by  their  attitude  towards  the  right  that  they 
know,  are  determining  on  earth  their  attitude 
towards  God  in  the  Hereafter.  .  .  .  They  are 
forming  character,  and  character  tends  to  per- 
manence. 

The  "outer  darkness,"  it  would  seem,  comes 
not  from  absence  of  light,  but  from  blindness 
of  sight.  The  joy  of  Heaven  is  impossible 
to  the  unholy,  just  as  is  the  joy  of  beautiful 
scenery  to  the  blind  or  the  joy  of  exquisite 
music  to  the  deaf.  Probation  in  this  life 
simply  means  that  in  this  first  stage  of  his 
being  a  man  either  is  or  is  not  blinding  his 
eyes  and  dulling  his  ears  and  hardening  his 
heart  so  as  to  make  himself  less  capable  of 
higher  things  in  the  life  to  come. 


78      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

If,  then,  it  be  possible  even  for  a  heathen 
to  have  in  this  Hfe  sufficient  probation  to  de- 
termine his  attitude  towards  God  for  ever, 
how  much  more  for  a  man  in  the  full  light 
of  Christianity?  In  view  of  this  the  great 
law  of  life,  that  character  tends  to  per- 
manence, may  it  not  be  awfully  true  that  a 
man  who,  with  true  knowledge  of  Christ,  wil- 
fully and  deliberately  turns  from  Him  all 
through  this  life,  should  thus  render  himself 
less  capable  of  turning  to  Him  in  any  other 
life?  With  true  knowledge  of  Christ,  I  say, 
not  with  knowledge  of  some  repulsive  misrep- 
resentation of  Christ. 

For  think  what  it  means  to  reject  Christ 
wilfully,  with  true  knowledge  of  Him: 

"His  voice  still  comes  as  we  tramp  on, 
With  a  sorrowful  fall  in  its  pleading  tones: 
'Thou  wilt  tire  in  the  dreary  ways  of  sin, 
I  left  My  home  to  bring  thee  in. 
In  its  golden  street  are  no  weary  feet, 
Its  rest  is  pleasant,  its  songs  are  sweet/ 
And  we  shout  back  angrily,  hurrying  on 
To  a  terrible  home  where  rest  is  none : 
'We  want  not  Your  city's  golden  street, 
Nor  to  hear  its  constant  song.* 
And  still  Christ  keeps  on  loving  us,  loving  all  along. 

"Rejected  still,  He  pursues  each  one : 
'My  child,  what  more  could  thy  God  have  done? 
Thy  sin  hid  the  light  of  Heaven  from  Me 
When  alone  in  the  darkness  I  died  for  thee; 


"FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  GOD—"        79 

Thy  sin  of  to-day  in  its  shadow  lay 
Between  My  face  and  One  turned  away.' 

And  we  stop  and  turn  for  a  moment's  space 

To  fling  back  that  love  in  the  Saviour's  face, 

To  give  His  heart  yet  another  grief, 

And  glory  in  the  wrong. 

And  still  Christ  keeps  on  loving  us,  loving  all  along." 

Is  it  hard  to  believe  that  a  man  thus  knowing 
Christ  and  wilfully  rejecting  Him  should 
thereby  risk  the  ruin  of  his  soul  ?  Can  we  not 
recognise  this  awful  law  of  life :  that  wilful  sin 
against  light  tends  to  darkening  of  the  light — 
that  every  rejection  of  God  and  good  draws 
blood,  as  it  were,  on  the  spiritual  retina — that 
a  life  of  such  rejections  of  the  light  tends  to 
make  one  incapable  of  receiving  the  light  for 
ever? 

If  this  be  so,  it  is  not  at  all  fair  to  mis- 
represent it  by  saying  that  God  cruelly  stereo- 
types a  man's  soul  at  death  and  will  refuse 
him  permission  to  repent  after  death,  how- 
ever much  he  may  want  to.  The  voice  of  the 
Holy  Ghost  within  tells  us  that  this  could 
never  be  true  of  the  Father.  We  must  believe 
that  through  all  eternity,  if  the  worst  sinner 
felt  touched  by  the  love  of  God  and  wanted 
to  turn  to  Him,  that  man  would  be  saved. 
What  we  dread  is  that  the  man  may  not  want 
it.  We  dread  not  God's  will,  but  the  man's 
own  will. 


8o      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

Character  tends  to  permanence.  Free  will 
is  a  glorious  but  a  dangerous  prerogative.  A 
human  will  may  so  distort  itself  as  to  grow 
incapable  of  good.  Even  a  character  not 
hardened  into  permanent  evil  may  grow  in- 
capable of  the  highest  good.  A  soul  even  for- 
given through  the  mercy  of  God  may  "enter 
into  life  halt  and  maimed,"  like  a  consumptive 
patient  cured  of  his  disease  but  going  through 
life  with  only  one  lung. 

Though  the  Bible  does  not  give  an  abso- 
lutely definite  pronouncement  on  this  question, 
yet  the  whole  trend  of  its  teaching  leads  to 
the  belief  that  this  life  is  our  probation  time. 
It  everywhere  calls  for  immediate  repentance. 
It  warns  men  of  the  danger  of  so  rejecting 
Qirist  as  to  render  themselves  incapable  for 
ever  of  receiving  Him.  And  this  has  been 
the  general  belief  of  the  Church  in  all  ages. 
Even  in  all  the  hopeful  words  of  the  ancient 
fathers  about  Christ  preaching  to  the  spirits 
in  prison,  who  in  the  dark  old-world  days  "had 
sometime  been  disobedient,"  they  add  some 
such  significant  phrase  as  "that  He  might  con- 
vert those  who  were  capable  of  turning  to 
Him/' 

And  human  experience  of  character  tending 
to  permanence  makes  this  fact  of  human  pro- 


"FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  GOD—"        8i 

bation  awfully  probable.  There  is  nothing  in 
Scripture,  nor  in  its  interpretation  by  the 
Church,  nor  in  human  experience  to  conflict 
with  the  statement  that  in  this  life  Acts  makes 
Habits,  and  Habits  make  Character,  and  Char- 
acter makes  Destiny. 

What  new  discoveries  of  God's  power  and 
mercy  may  await  us  in  eternity  we  cannot 
know,  but  from  all  we  do  know  we  are  justi- 
fied in  thinking  that  (in  the  sense  which  I 
have  stated)  a  man's  life  in  this  world  is  the 
determining  factor  in  his  destiny — at  any  rate 
that  a  man  who  presumes  recklessly  on  chances 
in  the  future  is  taking  terrible  risks. 

Yet  we  dare  offer  comfort  to  anxious 
mourners  grieving  over  careless  and  unsatis- 
factory boys  who  are  gone.  We  can  tell  them 
that  God  only  is  the  Judge  of  what  constitutes 
irrevocable  rejection  of  good,  that  we  cannot 
tell  who  has  irrevocably  "done  despite  to  the 
Spirit  of  grace,"  and  that  the  deep  love  and 
pain  of  Christ  for  sinful  man  remains  for 
ever  and  ever.  We  may  tell  the  poor  mother 
that  her  deep  love  and  pain  for  her  dead 
son  is  but  a  faint  shadow  of  the  deep  love 
and  pain  of  God — that  no  one  will  be  sur- 
prised or  trapped  in  his  ignorance — that  no 
one    will    be   lost    whom    it    is   possible    for 


82      ON  THE  RIM  OF  THE  WORLD 

God  to  save — that  no  one  will  be  lost  until 
"the  heavenly  Father  has  as  it  vi^ere  thrown 
His  arms  around  him  and  looked  him 
full  in  the  face  with  the  bright  eyes  of  His 
love,  and  then  of  his  own  deliberate  will  he 
would  not  have  Him." 

Ay,  and  more  than  that  we  can  say.  "The 
wind  bloweth  where  it  listeth,  and  thou 
hearest  the  sound  thereof,  but  canst  not  tell 
whence  it  cometh  and  whither  it  goeth.  So 
is  every  one  born  in  the  Spirit."  Let  no 
man  limit  His  holy  influence.  He  is  near 
men  and  prompting  them  oftener  than  we 
recognise. 

How  often  that  thought  came  to  me  in  the 
terrible  years  of  the  War  when  I  heard  of  a 
careless  boy  as  he  charged  into  battle  "putting 
up  what  he  could  remember  of  a  little  prayer," 
not  for  himself,  but  for  the  dear  old  mother 
at  home  in  case  he  should  die, — when  I  saw 
him  steadfastly  facing  death  for  the  sake  of 
duty,  or  comforting  the  last  moments  of  a 
dying  friend,  how  could  I  help  feeling  that 
God  was  near  him?  When  I  read  of  a  man 
killed  because  he  rushed  out  amid  a  hail  of 
bullets  to  bring  in  a  wounded  comrade  I  knew 
that  such  deeds  come  but  through  the  Spirit 
of  God,  and  I  seemed  to  hear  the  voice  of 
Christ  who  died  for  men — "Greater  love  hath 


"FOR  THE  LOVE  OF  GOD—"        83 

no  man  than  this,  that  a  man  lay  down  his  Hfe 
for  his  friend." 

And  so  I  hope  greatly,  for  I  know  not  how 
far  the  loving  Spirit  of  God  has  gone  with 
that  man's  soul.  I  would  not  make  light  of 
life's  awful  responsibility.  I  would  not  have 
you  encourage  mere  sentimental  optimism. 
But  I  would  say  to  every  poor  troubled  mother 
to-day:  Christ  cares  more  than  you  care. 
Christ  will  at  any  rate  do  for  your  boy  the 
best  that  may  be  done  for  him.  Christ  will 
not  forget  him.     Trust  Christ  with  him. 

"Through  all  depths  of  pain  and  loss 
Sinks  the  plummet  of  His  Cross ; 
Never  yet  abyss  was  found 
Deeper  than  that  Cross  could  sound." 

So  we  leave  them  in  His  hands.  Where 
better  could  we  leave  them  ? 


So  closes  our  brief  glimpse  into  the  adven- 
ture of  the  Hereafter.  We  have  learned  very 
little.  "We  know  not  yet  what  we  shall  be." 
But  we  know  that  God  is  good,  that  the 
Heavenly  Father  careth  and  with  hopeful 
hearts  we  wait  amid  that  wistful  crowd  which 
stands  to-day  on  the  Rim  of  the  World  look- 
ing out  over  the  wall. 


By 

J.  Paterson-Smyth,  B.  D,,  Litt.D.,D.C.L. 

A  People  s  Life  of  Christ 

Cloth 33.50 

Rt.  Rev.  Charles  Fiske,  D.D., 
Bishop  of  Central  New  York  : 
"  This  new  Life  of  Christ  ought  to  be  as  popular  in  our 
day  as  Farrar's  was  in  his.  I  am  recommending  it 
everywhere.  It  seems  to  me  to  be  just  the  Great  Biog- 
raphy which  this  generation  needs.  Every  chapter  is  a 
vivid  picture.  It  is  a  clear  and  definite  answer  to  the 
question, '  What  Is  God  Like  ?  '  " 

Christian  Endeavor  World: 

"  In  spite  of  the  splendor  of  learning  and  of  eloquence 
in  the  great  lives  of  Christ  by  Farrar,  Edersheim,  and 
Geikie,  we  should  not  be  at  all  surprised  if '  The  Peo- 
ple's Life  of  Christ '  exceeded  them  all  in  sale  and  in 
influence." 

Homiletic  Review  : 

"  One  gets  gripped  anew  with  romance,  the  tragedy, 
the  human  warmth,  the  heroism,  the  victory  of  that  life." 

Review  and  Expositor  : 

"  Dr.  Paterson-Smyth  has  charm  of  style  that  carries 
one  on  with  zest.  Up-to-date  in  the  right  sense  and  it 
will  do  good  wherever  it  goes." 


BT  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE 
HEREAFTER 

izmo,  doth,  net,  $1.50 


Circulation  in  Eugt'ish — ^0,000  copies 
Norwegian  translation  {made  by  a  Judge  of  the 

Supreme    Court   of  Norway,    assisted  by  the 

Bishops    of   Christiania    and    Trondheim) — 

J///  Edition 
Applications  for    translation   rights    have    come 

from  Holland,  Sweden  and  Japan 


The  Bishop  of  London  says  :  ^^For  the  first  time, 
it  makes  the  life  beyond  the  grave  so  attractive  as  to 
be  something  to  be  looked  forward  to.  I  have  just 
given  away  twenty  copies.  It  has  already  com- 
forted many  stricken  souls  and  taken  away  the  fear 
of  death  from  many." 


1 

Date  Due 

1 

f) 

PRINTED 

IN  U.  S.  A. 

